A better way to track bee health

A new automated apiary management platform lets beekeepers track their hives individually to make better management decisions. 

According to Quebec-based start-up Nectar Technologies, the ultimate goal of BeeTrack is to help raise more sustainable bees. 

A third of the world’s crops depend on bee pollination and according to the Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists, Canada’s reported annual national winter honeybee colony loss has been 25.8 per cent since 2007. That means approximately one quarter of all honeybee colonies die every winter and must be replaced. 

Why it matters: Helping beekeepers identify potential problems in hives before the winter can prevent large colony losses and ensure there are enough bees for the next growing season. 

BeeTrack is designed to help migratory beekeepers – those with colonies that are moved from location to location during a growing season to pollinate crops like tree fruit, berries, canola and vegetables – track and manage individual hives. 

“If beekeepers can track their losses to places they’ve been to, and identify locations that have been giving high mortality, then they can take precautionary measures, like feeding the hives more if a location is lacking in forage, for example,” explains co-founder and CEO Marc-André Roberge. 

Each colony is fitted with an RFID tag that can be scanned with the BeeTrack mobile app, making it easy for the beekeeper to track each hive as it is moved during the season. 

Once a hive’s tag is scanned, beekeepers can log their management practices, like treatments and nutrition, and even their queen genetics, through the mobile app. The gathered data is analyzed online and results are shown on BeeTrack’s web portal. 

According to Roberge, BeeTrack now flags areas of concern or those needing attention by the beekeeper, but the company is working to add prescriptive analysis, where the system will also suggest possible solutions. 

The first version of BeeTrack was launched last year, and Roberge and his team are now working with 15 operations in Quebec, Western Canada and the Western U.S. to further develop and refine the system.

“We are past the initial pilot or proof of concept, but we are still developing the product, so it is not available everywhere for everyone yet. We currently are working with about 150,000 hives,” he says. 

“We want to work with beekeepers to reduce losses but also to help them make more money and start working with data,” he adds. “We are ready to scale up operations with partners willing to work with us from a co-development perspective. We will co-design with you on your operation.”

The traceability that BeeTrack offers will also let migratory beekeepers provide their customers with more information about the quantity and quality of hives. That means the industry can be better prepared to deal with issues instead of finding potentially unpleasant surprises when winter is over. 

Roberge, whose background is in industrial design, is also a beekeeper and it was his experiences as a new beekeeper that originally spurred development of BeeTrack. 

Most management decisions in the bee industry are based on the experiences or judgment of the beekeeper or apiary workers, he notes, but as new pests emerge and climate becomes more volatile, he believes there’s a need for a more precise approach. 

“To be a good beekeeper takes many years of experience, and I thought there had to be a better way for my bees to tell me what’s going on inside the hive instead of me guessing,” he says. 

“We realized this need was very prevalent with commercial beekeepers. Our largest has 50,000 hives, so it is a whole other level to deal with that many hives on a daily basis. We are not about replacing the beekeeper but about giving them new tools.”

Nectar Technologies was recently selected as part of the first THRIVE Canada Accelerator, which supports start-up founders and entrepreneurs around the world with funding. 

The company also received funding from the Telus Pollinator Fund for Good, which invests in start-ups that drive positive social and environmental change.