ARTICLE – If you’ve been keeping up with the news lately, you know that this spring is all abuzz (ha!) with the emergence of Brood X (pronounced Brood “10”) cicadas. A brood is a mass emergence of cicadas which are the deafeningly loud insects (males trying to attract females) that you hear in the trees. …
Help entomologists track the range of Brood X cicadas using the Cicada Safari app Read More
NEWS – If you care about the planet, you’ve probably heard that honey bees are having a very rough time and are dying by the millions due to pesticides and other factors. Bees not only pollinate pretty flowers, but they are a critical pollinator of the world’s fruit and vegetable crops. Fewer bees mean less food …
BEEcosystem is a modular honey bee hive for your home Read More
I know nothing about recording microphones and I have often wondered, “What would I use a microphone for?”, until I read about a screaming caterpillar on Curiosity. The above video was obtained from Science News. Okay, so it’s not really shouting or screaming as we know it, but apparently, the Nessus sphinx hawkmoth caterpillar makes a …
“You don’t know the power of the Dark Side.” Apparently, a new species of chewing louse didn’t know either and thus succumbed to the temptation. Scientists Miroslav Valan, Oldrich Sychra and Ivan Literak, while revising “a collection of chewing lice deposited at the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint Petersburg, Russia” (from …
There’s been a bit of interest in plant monitors here at The Gadgeteer. (Apparently many of you have better luck with plants than I do – even my artificial plants look unhealthy!) The Parrot Flower Power sensor is a new entry into the wireless plant monitoring field. The Flower Power was developed in collaboration with …
This Parrot can tell you when your plants need water Read More
Gadget loving gardeners now have another way to keep their thumbs a nice shade of Green. Remember the Koubachi WiFi Plant Sensor that I reviewed a few months ago (see link below in Related Posts section)? That device sent notifications to your email and smartphone alerting you when your plant required watering. The Click & Grow Smartpot …
I happen live with someone who loves plants and gardening. Jeanne’s actually getting ready to take a master gardener’s course with our county extension office. Although Jeanne loves house plants, you couldn’t tell by looking at them. The poor poor things…
If you are one of the many people that struggle with the dreaded “Black thumb” affliction, there is a solution. Just place a Koubachi WiFi plant sensor in the soil next to one of your potted plants and it will gather temperature, moisture and light information that will help you keep your plant alive and …
Leafsnap is a new iOS application that is the first in a series of electronic field guides being developed by researchers from Columbia University, the University of Maryland, and the Smithsonian Institution. This free mobile app uses visual recognition software to help identify tree species from photographs of their leaves. Leafsnap contains beautiful high-resolution images of leaves, …
I live with someone that loves growing house plants. We have a bazillion of them in our family room. Jeanne likes buying and growing plants, but (and don’t tell her I told you…), she doesn’t have the Greenest of thumbs. At any one time, there will be several plants that look like they are just …
Your Computer Has a Green Thumb Even When You Don’t Read More
If you have ever wanted to get up close and personal with a hummingbird, you now have your chance with the Wearable Hummingbird Feeder from Heatstick.com. It’s a head mounted face shield with a feeding tube built into the forehead of the mask. The mask and helmet are painted Red to attract the hummingbirds, while …