Hello everyone,
For months now I wanted to come up for an automated way to water the plants in my balcony (25 of them, small and mid-sized dudes) and i gathered all my willingness to build or at least initiate the deed today. Spent 2 hours and came across Arduino and am blown up with it. Actually had a vague thought of trying with a Raspberry Pi and Python with a hope that I may succeed but I think Arduino has really got me moving from first impression (i actually started out with a search to understand how a washing machine's inlet valve functions as I just knew it automatically switches on water even though water tap is open always). My question - is this feasible to come up with something that waters my plants when i am away for 2 weeks or so and which can be controlled through internet? Maybe its too much for a newbie like me but If yes, please guide me in that direction and i will put that to best use. Will be great if i can reuse something if already exists or suggest me the tooling i may need 
Thank you
is this feasible to come up with something that waters my plants when i am away for 2 weeks or so and which can be controlled through internet?
It certainly is but it is going to be hard for you as a first project
Is is sure doable. I'm not much of a garden guy but I see this scenario:
Different plants need different amount of water, different humidity. All pots will not be the same exposed to sunshine, evaporation etc.
That call for quite a lot of different sensors as well as watering valve outputs.
Be prepaired for replacing humidity sensors now and then. Electrolyzis will eat them up by time.
@UKHeliBob - Thanks very much for the response, if i want to just start with Arduino then which model shall i go for ? I am hoping to myself start trading this path and it'll at least start the journey in that direction
@Railroader I really appreciate your response, my plants are kind of not-so-sophisticated or may be i am a bit ruthless when it comes to watering ! I was looking for a plain solution that could be like i use a solenoid valve to attach it to a tap in my home which then i control using a controller like Arduino with a logic to allow water to flow through the solenoid valve every 2 days for 1 min or so ..I think the controllable part here is to turn that solenoid valve on through internet and disconnect the power back as per the need. Any thoughts ? Maybe because I am very new and not aware of the hardships in the Arduino case but i am very excited to start somewhere !
Your project requires that teh Arduino be able to connect to your home network so an Arduino with built in WiFi such as the Nano 33 IOT will be needed but there will be a limit as to how many sensors it can read and valves it can control without extra hardware. How many soil sensors and pumps do you envisage using ?
i am just copying my response which i had to Railroader,
" I was looking for a plain solution that could be like i use a solenoid valve to attach it to a tap in my home which then i control using a controller like Arduino with a logic to allow water to flow through the solenoid valve every 2 days for 1 min or so ..I think the controllable part here is to turn that solenoid valve on through internet and disconnect the power back as per the need. Any thoughts ? Maybe because I am very new and not aware of the hardships in the Arduino case but i am very excited to start somewhere !"
I am actually not looking for soil sensors' implementation (though its welcome if i can get the data of water needs), the idea is like there are rough old school gardening pipes that has multiple dropper outlets and its one end is connected to tap through the solenoid valve.
Do you really need the internet part?? - having an Arduino turn on a solenoid every few days for a few minutes is relatively straight forward. You could put a soil sensor in a pot and take a reading with a lookup table for how long to run the water in case it rains.
Adafruit has a capacitance based soil sensor that will not corrode. They however are in New York and are not shipping for a while to keep from killing their employees.
"Maybe its too much for a newbie like me but If yes, please guide me in that direction and i will put that to best use."
Some reading for you.
https://www.google.com/search?q=water+plants&domains=https%3A%2F%2Fforum.arduino.cc&sitesearch=https%3A%2F%2Fforum.arduino.cc
zoomkat:
"Maybe its too much for a newbie like me but If yes, please guide me in that direction and i will put that to best use."
Some reading for you.
water plants site:https://forum.arduino.cc - Google Search
I have gone through some of the links and probably it will take some time to check through all the things in there but i feel its going to really help me thanks for sharing !
This is the moisture sensor I was thinking about
Adafruit STEMMA Soil Sensor - I2C Capacitive Moisture Sensor
PRODUCT ID: 4026
I think any of the Internet enabled boards the others have suggested should read the sensor and turn a few solenoids on and off - if you go with an automatic program add a real time clock for time keeping.
mecalling:
I was looking for a plain solution that could be like i use a solenoid valve to attach it to a tap in my home which then i control using a controller like Arduino with a logic to allow water to flow through the solenoid valve every 2 days for 1 min or so
Don't. Think about failure modes. If the valve fails open, water will flow for the time you're away and has potential to do a lot of damage in two weeks.
Better to minimize your exposure and use some kind of reservoir so you know the maximum amount of water that will be dispensed if something goes wrong.
Better to minimize your exposure and use some kind of reservoir so you know the maximum amount of water that will be dispensed if something goes wrong.
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I agree with your point..i recently had a horrific incident out of my water purifier outlet where i did not even realize and it flooded my kitchen and living room 
it was there on back of my mind for which i had thought to have a backup chk from sum1 in my apartment, at the moment i take their help to water the plants and that was my main concern to not to disturb'em going forward if i can. The main reason that i was not forcing myself into reservoir/storage thinking was the amount of water that i will need for 25 plants for 2 weeks but now after your disapproval i forced myself back, calculated with a calm mind and visualized myself purchasing some water storage of the capacity of holding water equivalent to 8 to 10 buckets as per my calculation (usually it takes a bucket for these guys every 2 days). If i get in this direction that I believe i will need to think of a miniature motor that gushes out the water down the pipes out of that water storage
I thank you so much for the response, any other help/guidance will be much appreciated.
saildude:
This is the moisture sensor I was thinking about
Adafruit STEMMA Soil Sensor - I2C Capacitive Moisture Sensor
PRODUCT ID: 4026
Adafruit STEMMA Soil Sensor - I2C Capacitive Moisture Sensor [JST PH 2mm] : ID 4026 : $7.50 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY electronics and kits
I think any of the Internet enabled boards the others have suggested should read the sensor and turn a few solenoids on and off - if you go with an automatic program add a real time clock for time keeping.
Sure ... just waiting for some more responses as i was suggested to keep failures in mind which is gonna push out the solenoid and might replace it with a motor now in order to reduce the damage. i might keep coming back to you all for help but not without my own tries .Please share if there is anything else you can and i get to the work as early as possible at least with reading the materials until deliveries start again.
This is a bit off topic but you might consider micro-irrigation. I'm an expert on the topic because I heard something about it on the radio some years ago 
IIRC, the idea is to take a fabric hose and lead it to the base of each plant and put a pinprick in it at that point. When water flows from the reservoir, it's delivered right over the roots of the individual plants. Apparently, it is a far more water efficient method of irrigating - might reduce your reservoir needs.
wildbill:
This is a bit off topic but you might consider micro-irrigation. I'm an expert on the topic because I heard something about it on the radio some years ago
IIRC, the idea is to take a fabric hose and lead it to the base of each plant and put a pinprick in it at that point. When water flows from the reservoir, it's delivered right over the roots of the individual plants. Apparently, it is a far more water efficient method of irrigating - might reduce your reservoir needs.
No i don't think its off topic bcuz i came across a similar post on you tube couple of weeks back (i had searched for techniques on how to keep plants alive when i am away, they had shown some tedious fabric stuff which i could not pay much heed as it was a video for a small looking fancy plant), what you are saying makes sense as we need to save water too. I will do some reading o IIRC and if it turns out to be thing, i will be happy to take your guidance and work on it thanks very much !
). I checked Ardfruit website and i see they got lot of stuff in there (probably you meant this product -rotected Weather-proof Temperature/Humidity Sensor