Flower Power from Parrot

© Parrot | Flower Power

One of the problems with traveling frequently and owning house plants is you lose track of when to water and fertilize them — or when a house-sitter shouldknow to do so.

That problem is solved by Parrot, maker of such futuristic gadgets as drones and speakers.The Flower Power product is a small, sleek, branch-shaped piece of technology that you insert into your house plant — or an outdoor plant — and senses just what your plant needs to thrive: water, sunlight, nutrients or a temperature change. And you can monitor all of this via a smartphone app.

© Parrot | Flower Power

The product’s rather unwieldy set of instructions essentially boils down to this: You insert the AAA battery into the device, download the Flower Power app, identify your plant from the database of 7,000 and place the prongs in the soil. The app then communicates with the product via Bluetooth and, after a day of synthesizing the information in the environment, reports back with what your plant needs to thrive.

If your plant is not in the directory, you can request it be added. Or, if you simply don’t know what type of plant it is, the device will work regardless. You just won’t be able to access the basic tips and needs housed in the database. What’s especially great about the app and the device is you can move it from plant to plant, storing each plant’s individual information in a sort of profile set up by the app; that way, you don’t have to maintain a one-to-one plant-to-Flower Power ratio.

Learn more about the Flower Power at parrot.com.