The gadget that lets you water your garden on schedule
Hozelock Cloud Controller £115, hozelock.co.uk
Rating: 
In the glorious future, everything in your ‘smart’ home will be controlled by an app on your phone, rather than a switch on the wall.
Losing your phone will become a disaster on a par with not being able to find your wedding ring or the title deeds to your home, as you can no longer even switch on the lights or make a cup of tea without the correct apps.
So far, I like to think I’ve stayed pretty clued up on developments in ‘smart home’ technology – I’ve tested a smart plant pot, for God’s sake, which means I’ve gone pretty far down the rabbit hole.
But I have to confess, the ‘smart garden’ is a new one on me.
Hozelock’s robotic garden-watering Cloud Controller plugs into anything from sprinklers to irrigation systems and lets you tap on screen to start off between one and 60 minutes of watering
The smartest thing to be found in mine is usually next door’s cat.
Hozelock’s robotic garden-watering Cloud Controller is actually a sensible idea, not a gimmick – although I can’t help wondering if hardened gardeners will greet it with the same suspicion Mrs Doyle in Father Ted greets the Teasmade she gets as a present, bought to save her from the misery of always making the tea.
Mrs Doyle snarls: ‘Maybe I like the misery.’
The Hozelock lets you water your garden on a schedule – or on demand, with a gadget sitting on top of your tap and taking commands from an app on your iPhone or Android (it plugs into your router at home, so you can turn on the waterworks from anywhere).
Small children honestly think you’re a wizard.
The Cloud Controller plugs into anything from sprinklers to irrigation systems and lets you tap on screen to start off between one and 60 minutes of watering, whether you’re upstairs or sunning yourself abroad I was expecting the app to be fairly half-baked, as it’s a first effort, but it is, in fact, extremely slick – you can even see how the weather is at home and give the plants a quick blast of H2O from wherever you are on holiday.
This gadget is built for people who genuinely love their gardens – and I noticed that my wife, who normally remains aloof from the parade of technology arriving and departing from our home, suddenly perked up
The app also suggests changes to your watering pattern (you can set it to water regularly at dawn or dusk), based on the weather.
It’s so highly specced I feel faintly guilty for underusing it – much as I do when reviewing a satellite - connected fitness bracelet by huffing and puffing round the park at 2mph.
I do water the plants in my garden, but largely only because it gets me half an hour’s peace away from the children.
This gadget is built for people who genuinely love their gardens – and I noticed that my wife, who normally remains aloof from the parade of technology arriving and departing from our home, suddenly perked up.
Up until now the main intrusion of technology into the average garden has been robotic lawnmowers – and, like most sane human beings, I have remained utterly terrified of those.
This adds a dash of robotic ease to the gardening – without the threat of chewing up your ankles.
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