Planters with Integrated Tech: Bringing Nature and Innovation Together

Introduction:

Amidst the trend of adopting a furry buddy, few individuals are still there who develop close bonding with their plants. They tend to celebrate small milestones like the sprouting of new leaves and have an emotional connection with their botanical friend. They nurture their plant with love and care, from the seedling stage and the plant reciprocates the same, by bearing fruits.

But plants are delicate and need enough sunlight, water, and soil for their growth. Nowadays, people prefer indoor plants rather than terrace gardening due to the apartment culture. With all these factors into consideration, many innovations are on the way which have made life easier for plant lovers.

The most common issue faced by plant lovers is the under-watering or over-watering of plants. To solve this issue, products like PICO which is AI-enabled and dispenses water automatically, as per the requirements of the plant.

Let’s have a quick look at a few of these technologies:

Technologies for indoor plants

PICO

PICO is an AI-enabled device, that grows in length according to the plant, dispenses water as and when required, and can stick to any surface as well. So, it is a gift in disguise for plant parents. PICO can store water for 10 days. So, no need to worry about plants decaying, while the plant parents are on tour, or having a busy day.It’s available on Amazon, and a little over-priced, but worth the investment.

  

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Flyte Lyfe

Flyte is a planter that has a magnetic levitation, enabling the planter to rotate 360 degrees, thereby providing sufficient sunlight to plants. It also has a systematic drainage system, that allows the water to escape to an inside reservoir, thereby reducing the threat of over-watering.

Also, the plants do not need any soil for growth. Sounds cool and less messy right? It can serve as a perfect home décor as well. This product is also available at Amazon, and many more similar products are available.

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LetPot

LetPot's self-watering planters redefine gardening by seamlessly integrating modular design and intelligent controls. Plant parents can monitor and control the temperature, and growth of plants. There is also a self-watering system. Data on the plants is available on tip via that app.

The company has its site, selling various ranges of smart planters. They are the pioneer of hydroponic systems accompanied by an APP that monitors the growth of the plant on a real-time basis.

The above planters are all a perfect example of Hydroponic Systems. The main aim of Hydroponic plants is to eliminate soil and nurture plants with the help of nutrient-rich water solutions. Thereby useful for indoor planting.

The further development of Hydroponic plants led to the introduction of Aeroponic planters.

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Aeroponic Plants- Outdoor plants

Aeroponics are used for large-scale outdoor cultivation of plants. It involves the use of a nutrient solution that mists the roots of the plant instead of submerging them. Therefore, it helps in using water efficiently, provides the required nutrients to the plants, and aids in faster growth. However, the cost to set up this infrastructure is expensive compared to traditional methods, also the maintenance is high. This method isn’t suitable for cultivation of all kinds of plants.

Garden Sprinker

Use of tech-integrated planters in Agriculture

IoT in agriculture

The Internet of Things (IoT) describes physical devices that are connected to the internet. They all have special sensors and software that allow them to collect data and communicate with other devices or networks.

Smart agriculture uses IOT sensors to collect information about the environment and machine metrics enabling the farmers to make informed decisions.

Innovative Technologies

Robotic Planters

Robots that are semi-automatic can detect weeds and spray pesticides with their arms preventing further damage to the crops. Further, IoT is used to navigate heavy farming vehicles to track their position with the help of GPS and perform the assigned task.

                        Pot and Bloom Mealy Bug Buster Spray

Drone integration

Drones have sensors and cameras attached to them and are remotely controlled, thereby helping in surveying farmlands. Through the data provided by drones, crop health can be determined, the amount of pesticides to be used, and the nature and quality of soil can be determined.

                   Agriculture Drone

Greenhouse automation

The use of IoT sensors enables them to get accurate real-time information on greenhouse conditions such as lighting, temperature, soil condition, and humidity.

For instance, Farmapp and Growlink are also IoT agriculture products offering such capabilities among others.

Precision Farming

Precision farming involves data-driven decision-making by the farmers. Information with regard to temperature, soil condition, pesticide levels, and water required by the crop, therefore reducing the expenses and bearing healthier crops.

The use of IoT sensors provides real-time data to the farmers, through which the farmers can predict the following:

•When to harvest a crop

•The volume it would yield

•Infections or diseases the crop might contact

Technology is pretty much integrated with both indoor and outdoor plants. The use of automatic water dispensers for plants as and when required and the use of IoT in agricultural activities have made life easier for plant parents who live in apartments and farmers who want to produce a bounty of healthy crops.