This year, there’s been a rise in digital resources that guide users through how to grow and maintain their houseplant collections. As someone who loves both houseplants and incessantly picking up my phone, I am here for the trend. I decided to try a couple out to see if they could improve my existing plant routines. Once you photograph, identify, and name a plant, the app creates what is essentially a baseball card of stats on it: when it needs to be watered and fed, what kind of humidity and temperatures it likes, etc. Plus, it serves up fun new tidbits about your plant pal. (I’m proud to share that my Bird of Paradise, Ernst, is considered the queen of the indoor plant world.) The type A plant parent can also use this one to track the last time they watered, fertilized, repotted, misted, and rotated their plants to keep on a consistent schedule or write in to Bloomscape’s in-house greenery team with a question—all for free! It’s totally free to use but does serve up a fair number of ads. Like Bloomscape, it also lets you input your plants into a virtual plant collection and offers up a few basic care tips for each one. Simply take a video of your space (with special emphasis on the windows) and within a week or so, the Steward team will draw up a plant plan that auto-updates with the seasons. Emma received her B.A. in Environmental Science & Policy with a specialty in environmental communications from Duke University. In addition to penning over 1,000 mbg articles on topics from the water crisis in California to the rise of urban beekeeping, her work has appeared on Grist, Bloomberg News, Bustle, and Forbes. She’s spoken about the intersection of self-care and sustainability on podcasts and live events alongside environmental thought leaders like Marci Zaroff, Gay Browne, and Summer Rayne Oakes.
