COLOSS honey bee research association

[permagriculture]

Was wondering if anyone has had any contact with Coloss?

The mission of COLOSS is to improve the well-being of bees (in particular the western honey bee Apis mellifera) at a global level.

– https://coloss.org/mission-goals-strategy/

It seems like it might be worth talking to them about standardising some stuff?

eg.

• “When we say “Temp sensor at the top of a Warre” We all mean it to be positioned X cm below the top of the hive”

• When we use sensors we calibrate them to X

It seems likely that electronic monitoring of hives will have increasing prominence over the coming years, and that by having that conversation early we could all reach some common assumptions and have them documented in the official ‘bee book’ for researchers: http://www.coloss.org/beebook

cc @Tristan_OSBH @clemens

[clemens]

COLOSS is an international association of bee researchers. I know some German members but did not talk with them in the context of the association.

I think some of the people at Arnia http://www.arnia.co.uk/ has bee in COLOSS also.

I don’t know if standardization is a task for now. We don’t know much about best sensor placement and some research has to be done before a kind of specification.

But you are right a lot is ongoing in the field of hive monitoring but I have seen no or less activity on the professional scientific side. Only Trachtnet in Germany is afaik active but counts on commercial scales.

I had planed to contact some research institutions in Germany (de:.“Bieneninstitute”) but did not find the time till now. I also want to present a awesome system by visiting them ;-) I do not have (or I think it is not perfect enough).

[Andreas]

Colony losses monitoring

The colony loss monitoring group has been active since the start of the COLOSS COST action, now the COLOSS Association, to study reasons for colony losses.

– https://coloss.org/colony-losses-monitoring/