Guest Picks: High-Tech Plant Helpers

What busy person couldn't use a little help to make life a bit easier? From soil humidity sensors to computer-generated growing tips to weather detection devices, a new generation of high- and somewhat low-tech gadgets are available to assist us all in indoor and outdoor gardens. These will redefine the notion that plants need a human touch. — Robin from Urban Gardens

Windowfarms - $199 » Windowfarms has gone automated. Now you can grow a vertical indoor garden year-round with this system. The tower supplies plants with nutrient-rich water that is cycled through a reservoir in the system’s base and then pumped up and funneled down from plant to plant. With a simple electric timer, the system is energy (and cost) efficient — it will only cost a few dollars per year.


Bitponics Base Station - $499 » You've heard of "The Cloud," that floating storage space for all the world's data, yes? Bitponics provides a similar service for gardeners through a "cloud" that connects via your WiFi network. It's a splurge, but it provides a pretty cool service: monitoring plant pH, water and air temperatures, light and humidity.

It alerts you should anything stray too far from the plant’s personalized plan, allowing you to make some adjustments via the web, anywhere and anytime.


Plant Link - $69 » Like a plant manager, Plant Link relies on data stored in a cloud. Place one in the soil near your indoor or outdoor plants (each plant area needs its own link) and enter the plant type into the company's website. They will provide you with a watering schedule that you can access online and will send alerts via email.


Herb:ie 46 - EUR 150.21 » A combination of hydroponics and intensive energy-efficient lighting, IndoorGarden's Herb:ie 46 offers apartment dwellers the gift of a garden. This compact container comes in black, white, red or green, and would be just right in a kitchen or on a fire escape.


Botanicalls Kit - $99.95 » Botanicalls lets your plants tweet and text their needs to you. It takes a bit of patience and attention to detail (soldering and wire snipping) to set up, but the resulting device allows your plant to directly communicate with you. Who said plants can't talk?


Smart Herb Garden - $79 » The younger sibling of the Click & Grow, this is almost eerily prescient, always one step ahead of you. This newer version comes equipped with a grow light, and like the original, it has a refillable water reservoir and a plant cartridge with seeds and a super-vitamin for soil.

Tucked inside the pot are electronic sensors and software that measure the plant’s needs, releasing precise amounts of fertilizer, air and water.


Erbizia - EUR 39 » Another cool personal gardener for you, Erbiza's unassuming herb box is more than meets the eye. It's filled with organic potting soil and seeds, and comes with a special code that enables registration on the retail site. Plus, the site doles out daily advice to ensure your chives, thyme, oregano and parsley flourish.


Rugiada » Italian designers combined their backgrounds in building, landscape and graphic design to create this multitasking irrigation device. Based on air and soil humidity measurements and type and quantity of vegetables, the Rugiada figures out the amount and type of water your garden needs.


Parrot Flower Power » Parrot's Flower Power will do most of the plant care work for you. It's an irrigation device equipped with a wireless sensor that measures sunlight, soil moisture, temperature and fertilizer. Be on the lookout for its release later this year.


Sprout Robot - $24.99 » "Kind of like having a gardening robot boyfriend" is how Sprout Robot describes its service. It answers the question on every new gardener’s lips: Where do I begin? Simply input your zip code, and Sprout Robot will craft an easy-to-follow gardening plan based on your location and climate.

They'll also send you seeds in the mail just in time for planting season, or you can opt to receive seasonal reminder emails to keep your garden on track.


Pocket Garden iPhone/iPad App - $0.99 » You can't beat the price: For just 99 cents, Pocket Garden is a mobile growing guide that covers an impressive range of gardening questions and concerns: everything from seed type, to germination and harvest times, to general planting suggestions about soil depth and plant spacing.


VegiBee Garden Pollinator - $29.99 » VegiBee garden pollinators are sonic, handheld electric pollinators that can be used in home gardens and greenhouses and claim to increase crop yield by 30 percent annually. Battery-operated and rechargeable versions are available.


Crystal Planters » Covered with a crystalized fertilizer, Maria Bujalska's Crystal Planter not only is beautiful, but helps nourish plants over time as well. The plant's roots grow into the felted fibers and feed themselves with the slowly dissolving fertilizer that's released from the crystals with each watering. The plant eventually fuses with the planter to become one constantly growing system.


Black & Decker PCS10 PlantSmart Digital Plant Care Sensor - $44.25 » This plant sensor has been hanging out with computers for a while, but it remains a great tool. It shows exactly what kind of plants will grow anywhere, inside or out. And it has step-by-step tips for thousands of different plants.


Koubachi Wi-Fi Plant Sensor » In addition to its sleek design, the Koubachi Wi-Fi Plant Sensor does a lot for you. After measuring soil moisture, temperature and light intensity, it determines the needs of your plant and sends you updates through its free smart phone app.


Singing Bird Plant Pal - $10.99 » A little birdie told me about this one! The Plant Pal moisture-sensing probe measures moisture at the root level, and when the plant needs watering, the bird sings! No worries at night, as a light sensor deactivates the bird sound when the room is dark so that you won't go nuts listening to continuous chirping.


Greenbox - $219 » Another garden-by-phone gadget, Greenbox is an iOS-controlled irrigation system that uses local weather data to determine and set customized watering programs and send them to you via your smart phone.


Floating Garden » The Floating Garden concept by Benjamin Graindorge and Duende Studio uses a specialized aquaponics tank and filtration system to recycle the nutrients in fish waste to feed and irrigate plants.


The Blue Green Box by Andrew de Melo » The Blue Green Box is an aquaponics plant-growing system for a 10-gallon freshwater aquarium. The box holds four plastic planter grow beds filled with gravel. Water floods the beds on timed intervals, allowing the plants to extract nutrients from fish waste and gravel (or other fertilizer) that holds the roots.


Mi Garden » The Mi Garden is a plant growing system complete with an integrated grow light, automatic watering system and a micro-controller that handles all of the watering and lighting. Choose your type of plant and its status, and then the system handles all the rest for you. All you need to do is occasionally monitor water and nutrient levels.

Next: A Bird Photo Booth for Your Backyard

URL: Guest Picks: High-Tech Plant Helpers http://www.decor-ideas.org/cases-view-id-21277.html