{"id":8707,"date":"2022-03-06T08:59:26","date_gmt":"2022-03-06T13:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dronebotworkshop.com\/?p=8707"},"modified":"2023-04-11T16:03:48","modified_gmt":"2023-04-11T20:03:48","slug":"soil-moisture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dronebotworkshop.com\/soil-moisture\/","title":{"rendered":"Water Your Garden with IoT"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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Today we will be working with some inexpensive soil moisture sensors. We\u2019ll learn how these sensors function, we\u2019ll see how to calibrate them, and then we\u2019ll build two projects – a soil moisture meter with an OLED display, and an automated watering system that works with the Arduino IoT Cloud.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Introduction<\/span><\/h2>\n

Soil moisture sensors have many applications in agriculture, research, and everyday gardening. \u00a0 By keeping tabs on the amount of water in the soil, we can make sure our precious crop stays hydrated, or we can get an idea of the conditions before planting.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Inexpensive moisture sensors are readily available, and they are great to experiment with. Today we\u2019ll see how they work, and how to calibrate them so that we can use them in some interesting projects.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our first project will be a simple soil moisture meter that uses a Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller and displayed its output on an OLED display.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then we will build an automated watering system using an Arduino Nano 33 IoT board. Our system will have an OLED display and will also use the Arduino IoT Cloud to allow you to monitor and control the system over the internet.<\/span><\/p>\n

I have to confess, however, that gardening is not my forte. In fact, quite the opposite, I have a history as a plant-killer. So don\u2019t expect any botanical advice here!<\/span><\/p>\n

But while I can\u2019t tell you how to grow prize-winning roses, I can show you how to keep tabs on the moisture in their soil. So let\u2019s start by understanding how we measure that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Soil Moisture Sensing<\/span><\/h2>\n

When we discuss soil moisture sensors, we are speaking of sensors that estimate volumetric water content.\u00a0 This is different from another class of moisture sensor called a tensiometer, which measures the potential that soil has to contain water.<\/span><\/p>\n

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There are a number of different methods of measuring the water content in soil:<\/span><\/p>\n