How was it that I, a professional gardener, couldn’t keep her houseplants alive? There, in the mirror’s reflection, my peace lily sagged, my begonia browned, my African violets pouted while bugs circled their leaves like vultures. Despite living by a bright window in a warm room, my houseplants resented me. I was an absent plant mom, never home, too busy trimming and tidying more important, outside-world plants to give my own kids enough attention. And it showed.
But I wasn’t going to give up my day job, or the home garden I loved puttering in on weekends. “If only I had a houseplant nanny,” I told my husband. “Like someone who knows a bit about horticulture to come by and care for my indoor plants.” He crinkled his eyebrows. “Aren’t you the plant nanny?”
He was right. It was a touch absurd to hire someone to do the very thing I knew how to do best. Then again, with a job, three kids, four pets, and a life in general, I had little time to water, remember when I’d watered, kill bug eggs with alcohol, figure out lighting problems, and on and on. Just thinking about it overwhelmed me. Ten more things for me to do. Well, maybe four, but hey, it felt like ten.
Finally, after months of anxiety-inducing, half-assed houseplant care, I figured out a key piece of the puzzle. I didn’t need a human plant nanny. I needed an artificial one. So I started experimenting with tech for houseplant maintenance. To say the least, life changed. For the way better.
After a few false starts, I discovered six things that function as a kind of houseplant nanny kit. They now keep my plants not only alive, but healthy and happy. That, of course, means I’m healthy and happy too.
Let’s say you were at the grocery store, saw an incredibly cool plant, lost your mind, and paid $50, then brought it home. Great, but what now? A plant identification app can help. You simply take a photo, upload it, and the app gives you its botanical and common names. Why is knowing so important? Because if you know where your plant grows in the wild, you’ll know how to keep it happy at home. You’ll provide the right light, water, soil, and food. You are the god of earth and weather in an indoor living space, so plan accordingly.
The iNaturalist app helps you do just that. It’s by no means alone in its field, but this is my top pick because it’s run by a collaboration of the California Academy of Sciences and the National Geographic Society. That means no ads and lots of reliable scientific information. Plus, it draws on a database that both professional and amateur naturalists around the world contribute to. You can ask questions, share experiences, and file photos to increase the public’s knowledge not only about plants, but any living organism.
A lot of soil monitors are more than competent at testing the pH of soil. But fewer ones give you information about moisture and nutrients. This flat stick from Wanfei sends its readings to an app you can check at your convenience. While its signal reaches only 15 feet, this matters little unless you’re traveling. You can still see your container’s moisture, fertility level, light exposure, and air temperature against a suggested range. The first thing to do is tell it what you’re growing. See above to figure that out.
What’s particularly handy are the kit’s daily, weekly, and monthly reports. They’re laid out in easy-to-read bar graphs that rise or fall based on how good of a plant parent you were that week, month, etc. For instance, my African violet was low on the fertility bar recently, which means it could use watering with liquid plant food.
The only drawback to a plant monitor? One stick sets you back $30. If you have a collection of 20 houseplants, you’ll empty your wallet quickly. I’d buy a couple of monitors and use them on plants you’ve struggled to grow successfully. Then carry on doing whatever you’ve been doing with the others.
Once you know what plant you’re growing and what it needs, you’ll want the gear to provide those needs. There are plenty of indoor irrigation systems, but programming units can get complicated quickly. I mean, if you’re an ace with plants, you can program a plant to be watered for three minutes once a week, another for ten minutes once every two weeks, and another for one minute every month. But if you’re a brown thumb just turning green, you’ll probably want this Yitika unit. It’s simple and easy to use.
Unlike my irrigation guy who fixes my outdoor lines with a tube cutter, hole punch tool, and friendly smile, you need only a hardy pair of scissors to work the magic here. Don’t be overwhelmed by the math involved in creating an array of lines. Simply subdivide one main line into two and then those into two and two more, and so on until your entire cluster of houseplants is covered. Friendly smile? Optional.
Though the Yikita’s rubber tubing wiggles easily enough over the emitters, adjusting the output flow is trickier. The twisty knobs can shoot too much or drip too little water. I’d put a tray under a test set of pots for a couple of weeks and check for overflow, then tweak. Also, place the filter, which pulls up the water, in a tall cylindrical container, like a 2-liter soda bottle. If put in a shallow bowl, it’ll rise to the surface and suck air, rendering the system useless.
Grow lights are easy enough to source but are oftentimes designed for small indoor herb gardens or low-growing succulents. Or worse, a nonexistent philodendron that never grows higher than 10 inches. You have a choice to go larger with a professional grower setup that needs scaffolding, or gooseneck LED lights that never seem to reach far enough when clipped to a shelf. For years, I used a metal desk lamp with a swing arm and grow bulb until the springs gave way. I wanted light 16 inches above my plant and that was the only solution.
That was until I found these Potey lights. They’re designed so the light-emitting area is flat and parallel to a container’s surface. They cast full-spectrum light in a wide round swath, similar to how a mounding plant naturally grows, ensuring good coverage of foliage. The best part is the telescoping feature. As the plant grows upward, you can raise the lamp’s height so your green baby doesn’t get scorched.
If you live in a region with enough sunlight but not enough humidity, or a home that’s heated continually in winter, you’ll need a humidifier to keep your plant happy. While it’s tempting to grab the first humidifier you might find off the shelf, you might want to consider a smart humidifier like this one. I prefer one between a desktop and small-bedroom size.
With this cool mist humidifier, you can set the room’s humidity to any particular percentage and the unit will maintain it for you. That’s handy since too much humidity can attract bugs and cause a plant to wilt, and too little will turn your leaves crunchy as they dry out. This also comes with a handy app to program run times and an easy-to-use top-fill design.
While my favorite use for mint is cocktails, I’ve also used it to repel everything from ants to moles. And this spray from Pure Origin, unlike heavier synthetic products and insect repellants, is safe for plants, pets, and people alike. While in a low-tech applicator, it contains a high-tech mix of mint, oils, and soap to deter bugs. Either way, your leaves will look awesome and the ambient air will smell fresh.
One note: Because mint repels insects and rodents, it may also repel your dog or cat. When mine notice the smell, they literally rear back and avoid the whole area. That means if you want to watch TV with your pup in the same room as your plants, you might want to move the plants for a couple of days or allow time for the scent to dissipate, usually 16 to 24 hours. But overall, for a nontoxic solution, mint spray can’t be beat.
So for all the brown thumbs out there, hopefully, you now know enough to at least embark on being a plant parent. I’ve found this kit has saved me not only from stress and hassle but money. I no longer need to toss the African violets I often impulse-buy. Instead, I enlist the help of my houseplant nanny kit to mind my green kids before heading out the door to tend to their outside cousins. The funny thing is they don’t seem to miss me.
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