Idiot-Proofing Your Garden

Cultivating a thriving garden without slaving over it several hours per day is nearly impossible. But now the game's changed, thanks to the folks behind Edyn, a new two-part smart gardening system built for the tragically black-thumbed. It works by analyzing the plants' progress in real time and waters them automatically only when they need it.

The comprehensive system consists of two main components: 1) a small sensor that sits in the soil and 2) a water valve that connects to your existing hose. By pairing with your smartphone (what else?), the sensor analyzes the soil and sunlight to recommend the plants that will thrive. Once they're planted, the device will ping your phone with alerts that require immediate action, i.e. when it's time to harvest or if they need fertilizer. Keeping the muskrats and squirrels from munching all the basil is all on you, though.

Saving you the trouble of daily spraying, the water valve (connecting between your hose and a sprinkler setup) communicates with the sensor to disperse precisely the right amount of water at the precisely right time. And when mother nature decides to take over? Already taken care of as it also factors in weather forecasts. Basically, you can't screw this up.


Joe McGauley is a senior editor at Supercompressor. You shouldn't trust him to water your plants when you're on vacation.