One of the coolest inventions I have seen recently is an adorable little robot named PLANTANIMAL. This autonomous garden-robot prototype was created by Pittsburgh-based inventor/artist/scientist, Jason Bannister. PLANTANIMAL is designed to wheel around its home seeking a warm sunny spot to soak up some rays. This ensures the plants living in PLANTANIMAL get plenty of sunlight.
PLANTANIMAL by Jason Bannister. Courtesy of Mechanimal.
Inspired by PLANTANIMAL, I decided to create my own robotic garden using items already in my office workshop. After several versions were created, tested, and tweaked, I came up with a robotic garden made from two broken RC cars, miscellaneous craft supplies, and a small Spark!Lab hydroponic garden.
A random sampling of “potential robot treasures” collected from my office/workshop for this project.
My robotic garden, named GROWBOT, finds sunny spots via radio control, attracting a lot of attention at the museum.
GROWBOT, Spark!Lab’s Robotic Garden Prototype.
Tips for inventing your own robotic garden:
- Take a trip to the local garden center! Decide what types of plants you want to grow. How about a robo-veggie garden, or an herb-bot for your kitchen?
- Consider the possibilities! Sketching ideas on paper may help or let your ideas be inspired by the “trash-ures” gathered from around your house.
- Get to work! Let the potential robot gardens take shape—build and then tweak your design.
- Share! Don’t leave the robotic gardening community waiting! Share a photo or video with us at sparklab@si.edu, or on Facebook.
