Some hobby gardeners enjoy working in their garden - for most people, however, gardening is rather bothersome. If you belong to the second group, then it's time to bring a little more technology into the garden and think about a so-called smart garden. In the following you will learn what is already possible and what really makes sense.
While smart home technology has already found its way into many households, the automation of the garden is still far less common. Many hobby gardeners still push the old lawnmower up and down the garden and spend what feels like an eternity watering the plants. Not so in the smart garden, because here components such as lights, lawn mower and irrigation system are networked with each other using modern technology and can be easily coordinated.
This way the tiresome tasks such as mowing or watering are done all by themselves. The only thing you need to do is to set your devices as required. You can easily control recurring activities via app and thus make gardening work much more effective.
Functional areas of garden technology include, for example, mowing robots, automated irrigation, light control, vegetable cultivation via app, weather sensors and plant sensors. Here are two examples of how you can “smartify” your garden.
Mowing robots are usually the first step to a smart garden and are available from just a few hundred euros. The small lawnmowers move independently through the garden and cut the lawn to the desired length. When moving over an area, a mowing robot orients itself on the so-called boundary cables or boundary wires, which are anchored in the ground by means of cable connectors and fastening clamps. When the battery is empty or when it starts to rain, the mowing robot returns to its base station. As the machine criss-crosses the lawn, the grass is mowed down to the same height everywhere and therefore looks even better maintained.
- Mowing robots automatically take over the often time-consuming and strenuous garden work.
- Especially suitable for people with allergies or back problems.
- Lawn mowing robots are low-noise, emission-free and space-saving.
- With this mowing technique, the cut grass remains on the lawn and thus serves as mulch that supplies the soil with nutrients.
- Due to the constant mowing, the turf becomes denser and less lawn thatch is formed.
Especially in summer, watering lawns, flowers, plants and flowerbeds can be time-consuming and cumbersome if you have to pull a metre-long hose through the garden or haul several watering cans. The solution for this are the so-called smart garden irrigation systems, which are available in a wide range of variants and make gardening much easier and more efficient. A simple irrigation system, which controls one or two lawn sprinklers, is available for under 150 euros. Depending on the size of the garden and your specific requirements, you could also pay well over one thousand euros.
- Irrigation systems take over the watering automatically, even during the holidays.
- Especially suitable for physically handicapped persons.
- Sensors determine exactly how much water the plants need so that they are not "drowned" or water is wasted.
- Saving water is not only easy on your wallet, but also on the environment.
In addition to automated lawnmowers and irrigation systems, there are a number of other ways to "upgrade" your garden, such as systems that use apps to coordinate light, camera, intercom and motion detectors. Here you can dim your lights in the garden or around the house, record videos and communicate via intercom. A personal security level is defined by app so that, for example, a video recording is made if the motion detectors detect an unusual movement in the garden. This not only makes the smart garden convenient, but also more secure.
