Back in our innocent pre-ChatGBT days, we were excited about how emerging technologies could help gardeners. We were on the watch for new phone apps that could help with identification of weeds, design, watering systems and more.

Those days are over. Now many gardeners simply assume that their phones have the answers to most gardening questions and problems. 

First, let it be said that there are a lot of great apps out there. There are also a lot of really bad ones. The problem is that many people just grab any old app, without bothering to research first. Plant ID apps really have been tested, as Susan reported about a year and a half ago. But too many simply don’t look at that information and use the first one they find, with iffy results.

The same thing is happening with mail order, though we can’t blame a bad app for that. The research step is being skipped and the results to a google query are chosen by the sole criterion of  lowest price. There really are bad mail order houses and don’t get me started on Etsy and eBay, where seeds for bright red and blue hostas are among some of the more flagrant offerings. 

Mail order houses for plants – especially houseplants – have been investigated and rated. I am a big fan of New York Times Wirecutter, which is like a much cooler Consumer Reports and very, very thorough. They did houseplants recently.

For outdoor plants, Garden Watchdog on Dave’s Garden is still around and seems up to date. 

There are also apps that claim to diagnose and recommend treatment for plant problems, from photos. I only know these exist because a few gardeners in my area seem to be using them. One person posted pictures of 4 different plants with obvious frost damage and said her app diagnosed this as fungus (the same fungus for 4 different species) and advised treatment with baking soda. (Of course, as we all know, baking soda, vinegar and Dawn dish soap are the three powerhouses of gardening supremacy. According to their acolytes, any problem can be overcome if you’re armed with these.)

Whatever app was used analyzed pictures without context. It should come as no surprise that May saw more than a few hard frosts and even a sprinkling of snow in Western New York. We’re used to it. I fix it by simply removing the damaged foliage if it’s too terrible looking, though my standards are pretty lax. But that’s really all you can do. 

Apps don’t know this about Western New York. Maybe someday they will – in fact, I’m sure of it. But if it means discarding all our hard-won gardening knowledge, our powers of observation and our familiarity with our local microclimates, I am not at all eager for that day.

(No pictures of bad gardening apps, just a scene from my May garden.)