As the days lengthen and warm up, many people can’t wait to get back out into the garden and get their hands dirty. Other, moan at the thought of additional lawn care tasks such as extra watering and mowing. But, whether you love spending time tending or lawn, or just tolerate it to have a nice, healthy lawn to enjoy, there are some amazing home tech for the perfect lawn and garden.
Here’s our three favourite tech gadgets for the yard:
Robotic Lawn Mowers
Ready to delegate the lawn mowing? Outsource what can be a tedious, time-consuming and sweaty job. Once only available to those with a substantial budget, robotic lawn mowers and now more readily available and more affordable. They are similar to the Roomba vacuum robot and once set up, don’t need much attention at all.
Perfectly suited to the smaller yard, most robotic lawn mowers can easily handle up to 1.25 acres of backyard and slopes of up to 20 degrees. They usually work with a perimeter wire or fence to determine the boundaries (and areas to avoid). While they will remove smaller increments of grass in one more than your traditional lawn mower, they can be set to automatically run more often – this ensure a healthier lawn and less dramas with grass clippings. You will still need to remove sticks and large debris before the robot goes out but they are designed with safety features to protect children and pets.
What to look for:
- Lawn size capabilities
- Rain/wet grass sensors
- Weatherproofing
- Object avoidance, especially in yards with a lot of trees or for families with toys left out on the lawn
- Connection to an app that allows you to check status and turn mowing on/off remotely
Smart Irrigation Systems
Smart irrigations systems remove traditional sprinkler system concerns, such as coming on during rain or not coming on during dry periods while you’re away on holiday. How? By making watering decisions based on factors such as the weather forecasts and the moisture already in your soil. These smart irrigation systems are available either as an add-on to work with your current automated system, or as a controller for a manual system. You can also buy a new automated system with smart features built in.
What to look for:
- A user-friendly app to give you status and remote control while you are away
- Integration of current and local weather forecasts
- Soil moisture sensor in addition to weather monitoring
- Integration with other smart home features such as your in-home security system
Soil Sensors
Some may scoff, but for the rest of us mere mortals, a soil sensor can be a great tech tool in nurturing healthy and vibrant plants. These sensors typically sit in the soil and transmit information to an app without any work on your part. They can collect data on the moisture in the soil, the pH level and even available nutrients. They might also track ambient temperature and light.
With this information at your fingertips, you can make decisions about lawn care tasks such as when to water and when to fertilise.
What to look for:
- Good online support to help you interpret the data. For example, some sensors can suggest certain plants for you based on soil conditions.
- Integration with a smart irrigation system
Much like other parts of our live, a bit of home technology can transform the chore into something a bit more fun, less time-consuming and even more accurate than what we can do alone. These tools will hopefully give you the freedom to spend less time caring for your lawn and more time enjoying it.
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