Derick Cheaney and Nicholas Romano, two students from the Mechanical Engineering Technology program, and Stephen Farr, a student in Electronics Engineering Technology, joined forces with Peter Wheeler of Humber’s School of Applied Technology to create a hive health device.

The team at Humber collaborated with miRoute to produce this hive health device that counts bees as they go in and out of the hive, measures the weight of the hive to indicate the build-up of honey, and takes the temperature inside of the hive – a tool that would be incredibly helpful to bee keepers and the farming community.

The Applied Technology students worked together to help design, program, and build a prototype of the hive health device, and in their experience, gained other soft skills useful in the workplace so they are ready for graduation.

“We had learned all of these things and we could finally see the result of all the work,” said Cheaney. “It was really empowering.”

The students networked with one another as well as various faculty and staff at Humber, and had the opportunity to work independently on a real-world project.

“Having Humber Applied Research support us was amazing. I just enjoy coming to work and figuring things out,” said Romano. “It was an amazing experience.”

The prototype ended up being a successful milestone for the project. Project lead Peter Wheeler stated, “The industry partner said that they would like to see all of this go up into the top cover for the beehive.”

Research team

Faculty: Peter Wheeler

Students: Derick Cheaney, Stephen Farr, Nicholas Romano

Partner: miRoute