Important going into winter that the hive hearts are operating properly. You may have noticed that the data was becoming more and more sporadic on the site as the batteries ran out. It was therefore time to get in there and change the batteries. Should be a really easy thing but I had typically made it super hard for myself. The ones on the frames were too deep in the hives to be changed easily. This is a problem going forward and needs to be remedied. The blue and red poly hives got new batteries and the hive here is positioned on top of the brood box where there is now space for the hive heart. The Shims that I installed last week have allowed this to be the case. Blue poly and purple hive have also had the hive batteried replaced. light blue and the red/ white poly hive I couldn’t find the hive heart. I didn’t want to leave the hive open for too long as it was cold and coming into winter so I left them till spring.
I am using PowerOwl batteries this time and the brand new batteries are showing 21%, 11%, 100%, and 11%. This is pretty disappointing. I need to find a better way of achieving a battery change if this is the way things work.
Batteries seem to be the let down on the entire beehive monitoring system. the scales should last 5 years but don’t even last 1.
Changing the batteries out in the field is hard. Take care not to lose the tiny screws as once they have been dropped they are impossible to find again. Also, the hive tool is very useful for opening the child-proof wrapper on the batteries.