This post describes a ‘Unicorn’ – something which I would buy if it existed (for a reasonable price).
I like my Irrigatia Solar Watering systems very much. I currently have two on my allotment, and they work very well. A solar panel charges batteries, and every 3 hours the batteries run a pump to take water from a water barrel to drippers near the plants until the batteries run down. When the sun is constant the batteries receive more charge, and the pump runs for longer, giving more water. Under cloudy conditions the plants are watered less. I fill the barrels from a stream at the end of the allotment, so it is not using valuable processed water (not everybody is so fortunate, but overall the system is very water efficient – which I appreciate as I still have to carry it all)
I also like Z-Wave based Home Automation, which operated on a less crowded part of the radio spectrum than WiFi and BlueTooth and Zigbee, which all use the high bandwidth 2.4GHz region.
What I would like to have – the Unicorn – is a Z-Wave version of the Irrigatia Solar watering system. The Z-Wave communication would be taking some power from the batteries, but the design is intended for power conservation, running some battery powered sensors, for example, for over a year on a battery. It could send a message when it started and stopped pumping, and also it if had a fault condition, such as running out of water in the barrel.
I am sure this would appeal to other technophilic gardeners.