Opent Plantbook integration for Home Assistant to manage your flowers

[@KrzysztofArentowicz]

I have no idea how YT algorithm works, but I just got my first Mi Flora sensor delivered today and out of the blue there is your video in my feed. Just what I needed!

[@BeardedTinker]

Glad you've found it and hopefully you'll have good use of the sensor!!!

[@WebmediArt]

Thank you for covering this topic in depth! I started off with some tuya soil sensors and already struggled to get them integrated. But now happy to get it finally into homeassistant.

[@BeardedTinker]

Great to hear! Thanks for the comment!!!

[@EsotericArctos]

This is awesome. Also, the length of the video was a good length at about 15 minutes. I have a few plants and having this database in Home Assistant, my primary automation system and what I use for dashboards, is going to be a good thing. Thank you for all the hard work you put in.

[@Moonbase59]

This video was a godsend-thank you for a concise and to-the-point explanation! My thanks also to Olen for all the integration work, and Slava for the work with Open Plantbook! And, of course, the HA devs. I'm currently migrating from Home Assistant 2021.1.5 (Raspberry) to HA 2024.10.2 (Proxmox VM), so LOTS of work to do, starting with an ESPHome BLE Proxy (server has no Bluetooth) to re-integrating all my devices and plants. It's truly a lot of stuff to learn again and install, but what you so excellently show here is absolutely the BEST way to integrate plants in a meaningful and usable way-highly recommended. Thanks again!

[@BeardedTinker]

Thank you for awesome comment! Yes, team has done a great work on integrationand Open Plantbook!!! Good luck with migration/upgrade - hopefully you'll have fun with HA again!!!

[@Moonbase59]

@@BeardedTinker Thanks, I surely will! ;-) Currently aggregating activity info from 2 smartphones (and some others) into one "Daily Fitness" display: Steps and hours spent with walking, cycling, driving, watching TV and KZbin… :-)

[@chrisdixon5241]

Really nice set of integrations that come together for a great result!

[@fins5150]

Yes, nice representation for a card. Wondering how many species are in the dBase. Been trying to get my meters setup

[@BeardedTinker]

Glad you think so!

[@BeardedTinker]

Not sure, but there are a lot from what I've seen since community is also helping and adding plants that are missing.

[@martonszoke4241]

Thank you ! it is very helpfull video ! thank you for your work!

[@BeardedTinker]

Glad to hear that! Thanks for the comment!

[@simonsayshomeassistant]

Hey BT! Just linked to this video from my Apollo PLT1 sensor video!

[@BeardedTinker]

Awesome!!! Thank you so much Simon. Still haven't had chance to check your Apollo video, being busy last few days...

[@iainhay2823]

Thumbs up before I’ve even watched as I suggested some of this was useful and you’ve done a video👍 I have this all setup and these are really useful. I shall watch now and get your take on it

[@BeardedTinker]

Thank you :) I said I'll do it...

[@iainhay2823]

@@BeardedTinkerindeed you did😊 Openplantbook is great, I’ve uploaded to it as well and it’s very easy. He’s done a great job with it.

[@lmorgan1509]

You shouldn't have to apologize for how long the video turned out. Heck, I would have watched it if it was 2 days long.

[@BeardedTinker]

Thank you :) really much appreciated.

[@yourcst1]

This feature is awesome! I successfully added the indoor strawberry monitoring feature, but when I wanted to modify it to the new light sensor, I couldn't find where to modify it.

[@BeardedTinker]

Not sure if you've figured it out but you need to use a service call for that.

[@adfjasjhf]

Awesome video. What kind of hardware do you use for the monitoring ?

[@BeardedTinker]

I'm using 2 (actually 3) devices: ESP32 based Higrow Board running ESPHome and also Zigbee sensor. Plus I also have Elecrow GrowCube and watering and sensor device for few plants. I've just released video today on those sensors and some other options that exist.

[@the_smart_home_maker]

Great video - thank you!

[@BeardedTinker]

My pleasure! Thank you!!!

[@iddiek]

Awesome! Going to ali looking for zigbee plant sensor!

[@BeardedTinker]

If you find a good and small one, drop me a line.

[@iddiek]

@@BeardedTinker really can't find one so i changed my mind and i will build it with esphome and esp32. i ordered the capacitive sensor and a veml7700 as ambient light sensor. i already have several sht20 for temp and humidity and some 18650 shields, will last forever

[@BeardedTinker]

Did you look at Mi Flora one? It is BLE, but does have everything on it plus batteries work a long time and is supported in HA.

[@clairerovic]

Have kept this for some free time. Thanks heaps I have now added this to my HA. Currently I use the Xiaomi sensor with various Bluetooth proxies - have you got a favorite sensor you would recommend.

[@BeardedTinker]

Just found a bunch of unassembled messages. Sorry for the late reply. I'm still trying to find the best sensor for monitoring plants. Something that would be waterproof, with good battery life, not too expensive so I can get a bunch of them,...

[@Moonbase59]

I use the Xiaomi/VegTrug HHCCJCY01 sensors (white, BLE, "international version") and am rather happy with them, except they've increased the price incredibly during the last years-from some €7 something in 2018/2019 to around €25-€29 now (2024). The CR2032 cells in those last me almost a year, and I get temperature, soil moisture, light Intensity and soil conductivity as well as battery state via the ESPHome BLE Proxy. No air humidity though, but I have some Govee H5075's around.

[@dah5050]

Very nice! Thanks a lot! Unfortunately, the flower-card integration doesn't seem to be compatible with the latest home assistant version anymore. In HACS 2.0.1 there is also no frontend / lovelace anymore. I guess I have to select just "integration"? ... I tried that and then got the error "Repository structure for v2024.7.14 is not compliant". Am I doing something wrong?

[@BeardedTinker]

It's still working as it was previously. You have installed repository wrong way. This is not integration, you should select Dashboard for type of the repository.

[@e_v_a_l_ca]

Now if I could only find (or build) a reliable ESP based sensor 🤷‍♂️

[@fins5150]

There's an open source called CHIRP, works well for non-smart (piezo and led) it has i/o header for I2C (AliExpress have them for $1.50 knock-off). I'm going to try to put a BLE module with a coin battery breakout on it and 3d print a case. Also bought some ESP32 Supermini's to try, but power consumption may be an issue. We shall see.

[@e_v_a_l_ca]

@@fins5150 my issue is finding a reliable capacitive sensor. Most of them are 💩. Someone mentioned an M5 stack watering sensor with pump that seems interesting but I haven’t tried

[@BeardedTinker]

That's a Holly Grail people are trying to figure out. From what I've seen in my community Mija BLE sensors look like clear winners in terms of how many people are using them. I'll be baying few to test. As for ESP32 - sad to say it, but you probably should stay away from them. The reason is power. Even with pure Arduino (over ESPHome), battery life really sux compared to BLE version or even these chubby Zigbee ones I have. And I have 7 ESP boards running for few years now. Spending more time recharging just to have data in HA updated every 1.5-6 hours.

[@e_v_a_l_ca]

@@BeardedTinker I don’t mind having a powered esp board for most of my indoor plants but will certainly consider your suggestions

[@JamesTenniswood]

The Xiaomi sensors with an esphome Bluetooth replay works well for me.

[@steffie.morris]

Nice video, tnx. I already had this integration, but i am still puzzled if the triggers or notifications can be changed? Or even show what triggered the alert for a plant and add that to a notification? Might be something for a next video? Tnx!

[@BeardedTinker]

Sure, shame I didn't get this a few days ago when I recorded the last video that was just released today!

[@paulus1412]

Awesome video 👍 Got it all working because of this video. 1 thing i am missing in the flower card are the dropdowns and checkboxes to select the plant entity etc. I made 7 plants as devices (no plant bluetooth sensors yet) but it isnt showing the dropdown to select an entity. It will always pick the first plant. Anyone have an idea what could cause this? Restarted HA, cleared cache tc.

[@BeardedTinker]

Did you try to add entity by hand?

[@paulus1412]

@@BeardedTinker Noticed in other videos that the UI wasnt working for the flower cards (maybe a recent HA upgrade isnt compatible). But for now i just added all plants via the devices/entity so i could sort them alphabetically and use the "add to dahsboard option (and changed the default plant card to the flower one). This was the fastest and easiest way to do without missing some or add duplicates with all the latin names :P

[@BeardedTinker]

In my case, the problem is that all of my plant sensors are down and that's why it may have looked like there was en error, but actually the reason was much simpler - no plant sensors available :)

[@GiuseppeLabriola]

N1!

[@Fynmar91]

The config tab on the Flower Card configuration is completely empty for me. Anyone else have that problem?

[@BeardedTinker]

Did you maybe try to clear cache in browser? That could potentially be the issue. Other than that, I'm not sure.

[@Moonbase59]

Yup, indeed (using HA 2024.10.2). I used the YAML edit mode to add the battery sensors (which have a wrong default). Clearing web data, browser cache, etc. didn't help. Also, after adding plants from Open Plantbook, the images only work after a HA restart.

[@Fynmar91]

@@BeardedTinker Yes I cleared everything and restarted HA. No success so far. Pretty annoying but at least I can still use YAML

[@Tretabyte]

do you have any good examples of zigbee sensors (could be affiliate links I don't mind), I use tyua ones connected to a BT proxy and they work ok but the battery runs out aprox every 6/7 months which is a pain.

[@BeardedTinker]

Ahh, unfortunately, no. I'm still in process of finding the best one. Currently ones I have last about 3-4 months on 3 rechargeable AA(A) batteries. But they are sooo bulky that they fit only in very large pots. Plus is that they are rainproof.

[@Stranger6900]

i have HACS 2.0 and cant figure out how to get to the "frontend" option or select "lovelace"

[@BeardedTinker]

In table, you should see type column - there you have few options - one if them is called Dashboard and that's frontend/lovelace. You can group or filter by type.

[@EverydayKindaGuy]

My wife has over 200 plants. I would go more broke smart'ifying them.

[@BeardedTinker]

Yes you would...

[@jurajhprobyt2107]

It seems that somebody will go to the toillet only after recommendation send by Home assistent

[@BeardedTinker]

Don't be shy, if you have issues, there is a way to get notified. Use leak sensor...

[@theTrigant]

Yikes, not open source

[@BeardedTinker]

As in, "not open source, so I can't"...? Not sure what you're aiming here. You have API and you can use it to get data. For free...

[@theTrigant]

@@BeardedTinker lol As in "open source, so I am smart enough to not using it" When you can't see the code while using a free service, you are the product. Unbelievable that I still have to explain this in 2024...

[@BeardedTinker]

So, I'm the product here and they collect what information? You probably know it so please share it. You're aware that this is a community project? And what should be open source on the web site? HTML and CSS??! And what are you doing on YT besides being the product 😉