Russian Student Develops “Smart” System to Save Bee Colonies
A student from Russia’s Timiryazev Agricultural Academy has built an AI-powered monitoring platform for beehives, aiming to tackle the global problem of mass bee die-offs and boost farm productivity.
Svyatoslav Saraev, a student at the Russian State Agrarian University – K.A. Timiryazev Moscow Agricultural Academy, has developed an automated system for monitoring bee colonies. His project, BeeCount AI, uses cameras and sensors to provide round-the-clock tracking of hive conditions, helping to prevent colony collapse and increase honeybee productivity. The adoption of such technologies not only reduces the labor costs of monitoring but also opens new opportunities for higher crop yields and sustainable farming.
According to the university’s press office, the system is a hardware-software platform installed directly on the hive. It continuously counts insects, analyzes their activity, and tracks temperature, humidity, and sound inside the nest. The collected data are sent to a mobile application that instantly alerts beekeepers to any troubling changes, such as signs of swarming or disease.
The urgency of this innovation stems from the global decline in bee populations, which are responsible for pollinating about 75 percent of agricultural crops. Traditional observation methods often fail to detect threats in time. The Russian system offers a preventive solution, capable of giving early warnings of potential dangers.
