Gardening is a fun and eco-friendly hobby. As technology continues to improve, more innovative ways are being invented to improve gardening. Reasons such as convenience, space-saving, and climate change push people to explore high-tech gardening.
Recently, millennials have taken an inclination to have gardening as a hobby. However, being beginners, some plants sacrifice their lives to teach new plant parents how to take care of a plant. With the help of high-tech gardening gadgets, wilting plants will be less of a problem.
Would you believe it if somebody told you that you could grow healthy plants without soil? Hydroponic gardening is exactly that—gardening without soil. People can have a hydroponic system at a corner of their kitchen or install a vertical farming container.
“Hydro” means water, and “ponos” means work. In sum, hydroponics translates to water work. Instead of soil carrying all the nutrients for the plant, water does all the job. The technology does this by incorporating nutrients into the water.
The water then flows through the system, transmitting the nutrients to soil substitutes. Examples of soil substitutes are peat moss, coconut fiber, clay pebbles, etc. Some systems don’t use soil substitutes and have plant roots directly in the water. These systems also come with LED growing lights to supplement the nutrients needed by the plants from sunlight.
This is great for gardeners who have a busy lifestyle, those with little space in their homes, and those who want to cultivate vegetables. Hydroponics technology makes it easy for people to grow plants because it calculates and controls the variables needed for healthy plants.
2. Mobile Apps
A wide array of mobile apps await modern-day gardeners as they try to build a community and keep track of their plants.
There are apps available for iOS and Android that allow gardeners to connect with other people. It’s like a social media platform but for plant parents. They can hype up your plants or help you identify unknown plants that you recently bought.
Apps that help you take care of your plants are available, too. Some of them gather information about your location to determine the weather and check on how much sun, humidity, or rain your garden is receiving. Other apps remind you to water specific plants, as they keep track of their moisture levels.
These apps could also be accommodated by certain technologies like a QR Code or a specific pot. A QR Code helps identify a plant. A pot, for example, is programmed to tell the app that the soil lacks moisture.
All the information a plant parent should know about their plants is right at their fingertips. When they’re away, they can still know the state of their plants at home.
3. Digital Pot
Speaking of a specific pot, a Japanese designer created a pot that tells the plant parent exactly how the plant feels. The product is called ‘The Pet Plant.’
The Pet Plant communicates the plant’s needs through icons on its digital screen. For example, the screen shows a happy face when the plant is feeling good. When it’s not in the best shape, it shows an angry face or even a tongue-out face.
There are more specific icons such as a water droplet, which signifies that the plant needs more water. It also indicates if the plant is in a hot or cold climate. The pot can be recharged through a USB. It also downloads information about the plant and transfers it to a computer.
4. Moisture Meter
This is probably the least high-tech gadget on the list. Still, it’s affordable and helpful, especially to beginner plant parents.
A lot of people tend to love their plants too much. As a result, they overwater their plants. Too much water or moisture leads to root rot and will eventually cause the plant’s death. To avoid this, plant parents need to wait until (at least) the top inch of the soil is dry. For them to tell if it’s dry, they need to dip their finger in the soil.
With the help of a moisture meter, plant parents no longer have to dirty their fingers. They can just poke the meter into the soil, and the meter tells them exactly how much moisture the soil has. The meter indicates if the soil is dry, moist, or wet.
Let Technology Take Care of Your Garden
Whether you need something convenient or you need help to try to keep a plant alive, these high-tech gardening technologies can help you. By pairing programming and tender loving care, your garden will surely be as green as ever.