Your hives are your business.

This website

beeyardwingman.com sets no cookies. It has no analytics, no tracking code and no ads. The fonts and pictures come from this site itself, so your browser doesn't ask any other company for them.

Cloudflare hosts the site. Like any web host, its servers see the internet address (IP address) of each visitor's device when a page is sent. We don't use that to build a picture of you.

The web app at app.beeyardwingman.com is served by Fly.io. Its servers see your device's internet address when the app's pages are sent, the same as any website. Your records are never sent there unless you use an account.

The app, with no account

This is the normal way to use Bee Yard Wingman. You don't sign up and you don't give an email address.

• Your records stay on your phone. Apiaries, hives, inspections, mite counts, honey, treatments, reminders and the bloom calendar are all kept on the device. On the web app they stay inside that browser on that device.
• Photos and voice recordings stay on your phone too. Photos aren't put in your phone's gallery. You can turn off keeping recordings in Settings.
• Backups are files you make. Save a backup and you get one file with your records, photos and recordings. It isn't locked with a password, and it includes your apiary addresses, so keep it somewhere you trust. You choose where it goes: your email, a drive, a computer.
• Your phone's own backup. On Android, the phone's built-in backup to your Google account may include the app's data. That is between you and Google, and you can turn it off in the phone's settings.
• Erasing. Delete any record in the app, or use Start fresh in Settings to erase everything. Uninstalling the app erases your records. On the web app, clearing the browser's website data erases them.

When you send us something

Some buttons open your own email app with a message ready to go: Send voice log, suggesting a fix for a word the app misheard, or a check of the bloom calendar. You see what's in it and who it's going to before you send. A voice log also says what phone and system version you have. If you tick the box for it, today's recordings go with it too. Nothing goes unless you tap Send. The voice log, which keeps what the app heard and how it read it, is off unless you turn it on, and it stays on your phone until you send it.

What the app asks other services for

Most of the app works with no signal and asks nobody for anything. A few things do need the internet. Each one is listed here with what it sends. When your phone asks any service for something, that service also sees your device's internet address, the same as when you open any web page.

Weather

To fill in the weather on an inspection, the app asks Open-Meteo, a weather service. It sends the apiary's saved spot, or if there's no saved spot, the middle of its zip code area, plus the date. No name, no hive details.

Spring timing

If you set "This spring is running" to Automatic on the Bloom tab, the app asks the USA National Phenology Network once a day how early or late spring is. It sends the same map point (saved spot, or the middle of the zip code area) and the date. Club slides can ask the same about the club's zip code.

Photos in flower

The "Photos in flower" links open iNaturalist in your browser. Nothing is sent until you tap one, and then iNaturalist gets only the plant's name.

Florida inspector

For Florida beekeepers, the club's local help asks the Florida Department of Agriculture's inspector map who covers the area. It sends the middle of the zip code area.

Forage map

The forage range map on an apiary's page, and the map you can pick a spot on, load their map and satellite pictures from Esri, a map company. To send the right pictures, Esri sees the area being shown, but not whose hives are there. The map only loads after you tap Show the map. After that the app remembers your choice until you tap Hide map.

Finding an address

When you type an apiary's address and tap Find, the app sends that address, and nothing else, to OpenStreetMap's address lookup (Nominatim) to get its spot on the map.

Speech to text

When you talk to the app, your phone turns speech into text. On Android 12 or later it uses the phone's own speech service with no internet when it can. If it can't, Android's speech service may send the audio to Google to be turned into text. In a web browser, Chrome turns speech into text on the device when it can; otherwise the browser sends audio to its maker (Google for Chrome, Apple for Safari). Bee Yard Wingman itself never sends your voice anywhere.

Reading your notes

On some newer Android phones, the app uses the phone's own built-in AI from Google to read your notes into the inspection form. It runs on the phone. Your notes aren't sent anywhere for this.

The Android download and updates

The Android app is downloaded from GitHub, and the app checks GitHub for a new version. GitHub sees the request, as any website would. It gets nothing from your records.

Links you tap

Some buttons open other apps or sites, like map directions to an apiary or adding a treatment to Google Calendar. They get what's in that link (for directions, the apiary's address or spot) only when you tap it.

What the app asks your phone for

The app asks for each permission the first time you use the thing that needs it. You can say no and still use the rest of the app, and you can change your mind in the phone's settings.

Microphone

For voice inspections, voice control and recordings. On Android, hands-free mode can keep listening with the screen off; while it does, Android shows a notification.

Camera

For hive photos, and to scan a pairing code if you use an account.

Location

Only when you tap "Save this spot" on an apiary. The app asks for your rough location, not the exact one, and rounds it to about 110 metres (about 360 feet). It doesn't follow where you go.

Notifications

For reminders, like a follow-up check or the next treatment. They're made on the phone. No reminder comes from a server.

Calendar

The app doesn't read your calendar. To add a treatment schedule, it opens your calendar app with the event filled in, or makes a calendar file, and you save it there.

Files

On older Android phones, to save backups and printouts to your Downloads folder.

Installing updates

On Android, Update now downloads the new version and hands it to Android's installer, which asks you before installing.

On iPhone, iPad and computers, the web app runs in your browser, and the browser asks for the microphone, camera or location in the same way.

The research file

Bee Yard Wingman can make an anonymous file of your records for bee research. It is off until you turn on "Include my records in anonymous research data" in Settings. With it off, the file is empty.

What's in it

A random code for you and for each hive (not names), dates, the zip code, county and state, and the middle point of the zip code area. Then the beekeeping: mite counts and how they were counted, queen and brood, diseases and pests from the app's own lists, treatments (with the lot number from the package, if you typed one), feedings, honey, where each colony came from and how it ended, dead-out causes and signs, how many years you've kept bees, whether you move hives for pollination, and roughly how many hives you keep.

Each apiary has a choice for research: "Zip code area only", which is the setting unless you change it, or "Exact spot, for research". Only if you pick the exact spot for an apiary does the file hold that apiary's saved map position instead of the middle of the zip code area.

What's never in it

Your name, apiary and hive names, addresses, email, phone, notes or anything else you typed (apart from a treatment's lot number), photos, recordings and weather.

Who gets it

Nobody, unless you send it. You make the file, it's saved on your phone, and you choose who to send it to. Nothing goes by itself. Once you've sent a file, the app can't call it back.

Accounts (being tested)

Accounts aren't offered to everyone yet. They're being tested, and most people won't see them in the app. This part is here so testers know what happens.

An account keeps your own phones and computers in step. Signing in doesn't put anything online by itself. Your records go up only after you tap "Put them online".

Your email address

You sign in with your email address and a 6-digit code. The code is emailed from noreply@beeyardwingman.com through Cloudflare's email service. Your email is used to send sign-in codes and the code that confirms deleting the account. It isn't used for anything else: no newsletters, no marketing. A code stops working after 10 minutes.

What goes online, and who can read it

• Locked so the server can't read it: each apiary's address and saved map spot. They're scrambled on your phone with a key that only your own devices have, before they're sent. A new device gets the key by scanning a code shown on one of your other devices.
• Stored in a form the server can read: everything else you put online. That's your hive records, apiary names, zip codes, county and notes, inspection notes, reminders, your settings and the Bloom tab, including any spray contacts you've added.
• Not online at all: photos and voice recordings stay on the phone that made them. The club setup and the secret behind your research codes stay on your device too.

The server also keeps a list of your signed-in devices, named by type (like "Android phone"), and when each one was last used. You can see and remove them in Settings.

Where it's kept

The server runs on Fly.io and the database is with Neon, both in the United States.

Short-lived records

• To stop people guessing codes, the server counts sign-in attempts by email address and by internet address. These counts are wiped within about three hours. The email address isn't kept in them as plain text.
• The server's log notes each request: what was asked for, whether it worked, and which account and device asked. It doesn't write down your email or internet address. How long Fly.io keeps these logs is up to Fly.io.
• When you delete a record, the server keeps only an empty marker, so your other devices know to delete it too. Markers are cleared after about six months.

Deleting your account

In the app, go to your account in Settings and tap "Delete my account". The app emails you a code to make sure it's you. Deleting removes your account, your email address, your devices, your sign-ins and every record you put online. The records on your phone stay on your phone.

To erase your records online but keep the account, use Start fresh in Settings and choose "Erase them online too".

Fly.io and Neon may keep their own short-term safety copies and logs under their own rules. We can't promise how long those last.

Hive locations

Your hive locations are never shown to other beekeepers, clubs or club leaders. There is no map of other people's yards in the app, and no way to look anyone up.

If you share your month's numbers with your club, the file holds counts (hives, inspections, mite levels, swarms, dead-outs, honey) plus the county and state of your first apiary with a zip code. It never holds apiary or hive names, addresses or map spots. Your name is in it only if you type it.

Children

Bee Yard Wingman is made for beekeepers. It isn't aimed at children under 13, and it doesn't ask anyone's age. If you think a child has given us an email address through an account, write to us and we'll delete it.

Selling and ads

We don't sell anything about you or your bees, and we don't share it with advertisers. There are no ads in the app. The app has no advertising, analytics or crash-reporting code from other companies in it.