It is a sad state of affairs that there are some scumbags out there stealing beehives and as many of you know there have been several hive thefts reported in the last few months in NZ and Australia (picture on left from recent stuff.co.nz article. Click here for full story, or here for recent Australian case).
For some time we have been looking out for a reasonably inexpensive GPS tracker that would be suitable for hive tracking and think we now have a good solution that is still satellite based (needed for remote locations). If you are interested in finding out more and/or helping test out some of these please let Christian know (e-mail: christian@hivemind.co.nz or phone +64 21 846 445).
We are also talking with a company that has some new technology that will provide inexpensive tracking within range of a cell phone network that may suit some people if your hive locations are not quite so remote. We have yet to receive the hardware for this but we should have it soon so watch this space and/or let us know if this is of interest.
Of course our existing scales and hub can act as a security warning device too, particularly if you have your auto-alerts set up (so you will get notified if the weight drops below a reasonable level e.g. if someone moved a hive off them), and the existing hub has a very accurate GPS tracker in it as well.
