By Victoria Torley

We gardeners are always on the lookout for new plants or new varieties of plants we are already growing. The problem is that we often can’t find the name of a plant we saw in someone’s yard – even the gardener doesn’t know the name – so we may miss something we like and want to add to the garden. What’s a gardener to do? Well, here are some helpful ideas to help you in your search.

Got a cell phone (and who doesn’t)? Try one of the apps for the phone. Just take a picture of the flower or plant and dial it up. First there are PlantSnap.com and pl@ntNet.com. Plantsnap claims to have 90 percent of the world’s plants in its database or over 600,000 plants and 250 million images to help you identify your picture. Pl@ntnet is a smartphone app that promises to both identify your plant but share your photo of the plant with scientists around the world so that plant biodiversity can be maintained. I would love to tell you how they work but neither will download to my phone (okay, I am a techno-idiot). Next we have Picture. This which will read your location and add it to a database on where certain plants are found. This can be handy if you take a lot of pictures.

And here’s a handy little app: Plantix. Plantix is used to scan parts of plants that are diseased or are being attacked by insects. It claims to not just identify the problem but suggest a solution – usually a pesticide or fungicide. Very handy. It also includes a forum where you can ask the community about your plant troubles and get helpful solutions in return.

Garden Tags is an Android app which doesn’t stop provide identification. Instead, it will share your picture with its community members and give information on the care of the plant selected, a handy idea.

Then there are the others. Moon & Garden, for example, will tell you how to plant according to the lunar cycles. This is something I usually ignore as unscientific, but some gardeners swear by it. To each his own and I mention it here for those who want to give it a try. GrowIt is another app that focuses on what grows well in local areas. I haven’t tried it so I don’t know if “local” includes tropical climes. If you happen to try it, please send me some feedback.

Gardenize sounds interesting and is supposed to help with where specific plants should be located in the garden and help with crop rotation.

For more apps, go to DigitalTrends.com for a list with a description. And do remember to let us know how things work out.




Here’s a lovely little shade lover that I picked up at a local feria. Ferias are great places for inexpensive plants, but make sure you buy-it-when-you-see-it because the chances are it won’t appear again. Naturally, when I asked for the name, I got a blank look. That’s fine, all I really need to know is “sun or shade?” My guess is that this is from the Dracaena family. Anyone else like to take a guess?


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For more information on this article of request for information about gardening, Ms. Victoria Torley, gardener columnist, can be reached at victoriatorley1@gmail.com 
 

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