{"id":1746,"date":"2013-06-19T10:53:16","date_gmt":"2013-06-19T09:53:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/?p=1746"},"modified":"2013-06-19T11:30:55","modified_gmt":"2013-06-19T10:30:55","slug":"ecoids-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/posts\/ecoids-update\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecoids update"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ecoid\"<\/a>\u00a0Ecoids update: pilot project now complete<\/p>\n

A pilot project to carry out environmental monitoring at West Town Farm has been a great success. Visitors to West Town Farm in the spring may have seen the eight prototype \u2018ecoids\u2019 hanging in bushes and trees close to the farmyard. Loaned by i-DAT at Plymouth University, these little devices switched on every 40 minutes \u2013 day and night, for over a month \u2013 to collect and transmit data about local temperatures, light levels, humidity and wind strength.<\/p>\n

They are part of a project called\u00a0Foreign Soil<\/i>\u00a0led by artist Gabrielle Hoad<\/a> in collaboration with organicARTS and West Town Farm.\u00a0Foreign Soil<\/i>\u00a0is a documented attempt to grow dessert bananas outdoors in the UK, and ecoids will be used to identify potential microclimates around the farm where tender crops could thrive. The devices, and the data they generate, may also be used by local schools for education projects.<\/p>\n

First, however, Christopher Hunt, an MRes student with i-DAT, will be making some improvements to the ecoid techonology. There will be system enhancements to ensure the back-up programs are fully reliable, and the local laptop, which collects and forwards data, will be replaced with a Raspberry Pi. [http:\/\/www.raspberrypi.org\/faqs<\/a>]\n

Data from the ecoids (both real-time and historical) will soon be made publicly available via a website.\u00a0 (The Cosm website, which previously hosted this data, is no longer operating.)<\/p>\n

Standard batteries will be replaced with batteries charged by solar or wind power, so that ecoids can stay in place for longer. This means we can leave some of them permanently switched on to use as routers, so that we can transmit data over longer distances. Once our range increases, we can start to understand more about the many different environments around the farm.<\/p>\n

In addition, more sophisticated sensors will be incorporated in the ecoids to ensure they operate consistently with one another and can be properly calibrated with standard measurements (subject to funding).<\/p>\n

After their stint at West Town Farm during a wet and windy spring, the hardy ecoids were still in perfect working order. They were re-programmed and given new batteries ready for a project in Germany.\u00a0 Ecoids may make a return visit to West Town Farm later this year for a test-run of some of their new features.<\/p>\n

Data collected so far is now being compiled and analysed for use in Gabrielle Hoad\u2019s banana-growing project and associated artworks.\u00a0 For updates, visit\u00a0britishbanana.blogspot.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0Ecoids update: pilot project now complete A pilot project to carry out environmental monitoring at West Town Farm has been a great success. Visitors to West Town Farm in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":1748,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,20,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-outdoor-creative-space","category-rural"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1746"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1746\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1758,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1746\/revisions\/1758"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.organicarts.org.uk\/projects\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}