> >They are getting carried away and losing sight of the prime
> >purpose which is to combat swarming.  It seems to me that because the
> >equipment is capable of it, they want to do a complete spectrum analysis
> >on every visit, repeating what Eddie Woods did 50 years ago.

I think we are dealing with a conjunction of several different threads here.

On the one hand, we have been considering what Jerry is up to and the many
possibilities that are opening up with state of the art modern AI and
communications techniques coupled with miniaturization and dropping prices, on
the other we have been discussing the Apidictor.  Add to that the question of
bee intelligence and consciousness, and the bee dance and 'purpose' and its easy
to see that we have a lot of files open.  Personally, I'm approaching a stack
overflow <G>.  As it happens, I'm also currently working my way through "The Age
of the Spiritual Machine", one or two pages page at a time, and I must say that
this all seems to converge...

Some time back, Jerry asked me to give him a wish list of things I would like --
as a commercial beekeeper -- to be able to read remotely at my home computer in
the morning about the same time I am browsing at the 'Net newspapers I receive
each day.  I'm afraid I haven't answered him very completely, I mostly said that
a remote readout of individual hive weights and several reports compiled from
that to highlight problem hives, problem yards, flows and potential starvation
would be the most useful.

I guess that seems pretty trivial, given all the possibilities.  Maybe I should
ask for a buzz analysis too.  I'm afraid that I simply have not applied my
imagination to the problem as much as I should have.

Maybe the list will help.  Can any of you that have some good ideas give me (and
Jerry) a wish list of hive readouts you would like to have along with an
explanation?  We're thinking of an operation that has more than a few hives, but
perhaps even a hobbyist with a few hives set up a long way from home could
afford and benefit from such a system.

As for the topics we discuss, personally, I don't think one approach excludes
another, since we would all love to have an Apidictor  AND a satellite
monitoring system.  (FWIW, I doubt I would use the Apidictor a lot, though,
since most commercial beekeepers do not find swarming a big problem, but it
would be a fun toy).

allen



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