Mark your colonies with an NFC chip and QR code

Anyone who keeps more than a handful of colonies knows the problem: the marker pen on the lid fades, the note under the stone goes soggy, and in spring you stand in front of two hives and are no longer sure which one was the weak one in autumn. A marking on a colony has to do two things: survive a winter and be unambiguous.

You can get the APITag in the iBeekeeper shop. Depending on quantity, an APITag costs €3.00 to €3.39, incl. VAT, plus shipping.

Buy the APITag in the shop

What sets the APITag apart from an NFC sticker

• It sticks to metal. On the metal lid, where ordinary NFC stickers stay silent.
• It cannot be overwritten. The target is stored permanently, so nobody can slip in a different address along the way.
• The number is printed on it. You can see which tag is in front of you without a phone, and you can use the number in your paper records just the same.

Why cheap NFC stickers are no good on a hive

If you have tried it, you know the result: in your hand the phone reads the sticker straight away, on the metal lid nothing happens. Metal interferes with the radio field NFC works with. The APITag is built for this and expressly approved for metal surfaces, which is why it works where others fail.

Scan the tag, the colony opens

You assign the tag to a colony once in the Bienenvölker app. After that, simply hold your phone to the hive: the app opens that very colony, with its hive card, last inspection, treatments and harvests. No searching through lists, no mix-ups at the apiary, not even with gloves on.

And if someone else scans it?

Sooner or later, a walker at the edge of the field will hold their phone to the hive. Anyone scanning without the app does not end up in your hive cards. What they see instead is up to you: your website, your Instagram account or a prepared message. These visits are counted, so you can see whether anyone is scanning at the apiary at all.

What happens when someone scans outside the app is set in the web app under “APITags”: open iBeekeeper, open a website, make a call, prepare an email, text or WhatsApp message, show a place, open Instagram, YouTube or PayPal, or run a shortcut on Apple devices.

An APITag for every hive part

Every hive part can get its own APITag: the hive itself, each box, the lid, the floor. From the labelled parts you then put together a material set in the web app's inventory, for example a hive made of floor, boxes and lid. If you like, you can assign the set to a colony.

What the tag is made of

30 mm diameter, PVC with a 3M adhesive layer on the back, a central 3 mm hole for a nail or drawing pin. Waterproof to IP67, rated from −25 °C to +70 °C, data retention ten years. Made in Germany, each one individually tested for function.

Further reading

Marking colonies clearly: number, QR code or NFC: what each method is worth and why most NFC stickers fail on a metal lid.