Field guide

Across the apiary: compare hives, splits, and lineage

As you grow from one hive to a full yard, ColonyTrack helps you see the whole operation: rank your colonies to pick your breeders, trace every split back to its parent, watch the whole apiary on one chart, map your locations, and share a read-only view with a mentor.

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How do you find your best all-around colony?

ColonyTrack ranks your hives with one combined score built from varroa counts, temperament, and harvest. Temperament is the calm-to-defensive rating you log on each visit, so the score reflects how a colony actually behaves, not just its numbers. Instead of a vague sense that "the hive by the fence does well," you get an honest ranking. That is the colony you graft from, split from, or raise your next queens off, and the one whose genetics you want to spread through the yard.

What is a split-and-lineage tree?

Every time you make a split, ColonyTrack links the new colony to its parent. Over a season or two that builds into a family tree of your whole apiary: which hives came from which, how many generations deep a line runs, and who your strongest colonies descend from. When you are choosing what to breed or which line to retire, that history is the difference between selective breeding and guessing.

Can you see the whole yard at once?

The apiary dashboard gives you Overview, Trends, and Compare in one place. Tap any number to see the hives behind it, and plot every colony's varroa count on a single chart so the one trending the wrong way stands out at a glance instead of hiding in a stack of individual records.

Can you map your apiaries?

Yes. Pin each apiary on a map and see its forage range at a glance, with rings at roughly 1, 3, and 5 km, the distances honey bees actually work a yard. It is an easy way to picture how far your foragers are ranging and where two yards might overlap.

How do you share with a mentor?

ColonyTrack creates a read-only link that shows your inspections and photos. Your mentor needs no account and cannot change anything. Most beekeepers do not decide in the moment anyway; they photograph what they see, ask their club or a mentor, and act on the next visit. A shareable record is what holds that thread together.

FAQ

How does ColonyTrack rank hives?

With one combined score per colony, built from varroa counts, temperament, and harvest, so you can pick your breeders on evidence.

Does it track queen lineage across splits?

Yes. Splits link parent to child, building a family tree of your apiary across generations.

Can a mentor see my hives without an account?

Yes. You send a read-only link. They see your inspections and photos, with no account and no edit access.

Written by Bogdan, a Santa Barbara beekeeper working toward UC Davis Master Beekeeper certification. Field-tested on our own hives.

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