In this post I show how I try to use Home Assistant to monitor my plants and remind me to water them.
The sensor used is a MiFlora-compatible soil sensor. These sensors measure temperature, brightness, soil moisture and soil conductivity.
The data is sent via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). Originally, I had connected the sensors directly to the Home Assistant Raspberry Pi and
the custom integration Passive BLE monitor. On the one hand, I had the problem that the sensors were too far away and only received data irregularly.
On the other hand, the sensors were undefined for a while after restarting Home Assistant.
Now I have switched the integration to ESPhome and it works much better. I am now using an ESP32 with the following configuration:
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esphome:
name: ble_node
platform: ESP32
board: nodemcu-32s
wifi:
ssid: !secret wifi-ssid
password: !secret wifi-password
# Enable logging
logger:
# Enable Home Assistant API
api:
password: !secret esphome-password
ota:
password: !secret esphome-password
esp32_ble_tracker:
sensor:
- platform: xiaomi_hhccjcy01
mac_address: 'C4:7C:8D:6B:AD:FF'
temperature:
name: "Bauernhortensie Temperature"
moisture:
name: "Bauernhortensie Moisture"
illuminance:
name: "Bauernhortensie Illuminance"
conductivity:
name: "Bauernhortensie Soil Conductivity"
battery_level:
name: "Bauernhortensie Battery Level"
- platform: xiaomi_hhccjcy01
mac_address: 'C4:7C:8D:6B:95:FB'
temperature:
name: "Kleine Lilie Temperature"
moisture:
name: "Kleine Lilie Moisture"
illuminance:
name: "Kleine Lilie Illuminance"
conductivity:
name: "Kleine Lilie Soil Conductivity"
battery_level:
name: "Kleine Lilie Battery Level"
- platform: xiaomi_hhccjcy01
mac_address: 'C4:7C:8D:6B:94:7A'
temperature:
name: "Peace Lily Temperature"
moisture:
name: "Peace Lily Moisture"
illuminance:
name: "Peace Lily Illuminance"
conductivity:
name: "Peace Lily Soil Conductivity"
battery_level:
name: "Peace Lily Battery Level"
- platform: xiaomi_hhccjcy01
mac_address: 'C4:7C:8D:6C:2F:FC'
temperature:
name: "Alpenveilchen Temperature"
moisture:
name: "Alpenveilchen Moisture"
illuminance:
name: "Alpenveilchen Illuminance"
conductivity:
name: "Alpenveilchen Soil Conductivity"
battery_level:
name: "Alpenveilchen Battery Level"
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I combine the individual sensors into plant entities in Home Assistant so that they can be visualised with the appropriate Lovelace Card.
A plant configuration looks like this:
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alpenveilchen:
sensors:
moisture: sensor.alpenveilchen_moisture
temperature: sensor.alpenveilchen_temperature
conductivity: sensor.alpenveilchen_soil_conductivity
brightness: sensor.alpenveilchen_illuminance
min_brightness: 3500
max_brightness: 30000
min_temperature: 8
max_temperature: 35
min_moisture: 15
max_moisture: 60
min_conductivity: 350
max_conductivity: 2000
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The values for min and max come from the database of khronimo.
In Lovelace it then looks like this with the lovelace-flower-card from HACS:
To make sure that I get something out of the whole thing and am reminded to water, I have set up an automation that
sends me a notification on my mobile phone with the values of the humidity humidity sensors.
The automation is triggered when I come home.
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trigger:
- platform: zone
entity_id: person.thomas
zone: zone.home
event: enter
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I have entered as a condition that the automation should only be triggered three days a week. I have also created
an input_boolean with which I can prevent the automation from being triggered more than once on the same day.
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condition:
- condition: state
entity_id: input_boolean.pflanzenstatus
state: 'off'
- condition: time
weekday:
- mon
- wed
- fri
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The content of the notification is assembled via a template that runs through all plant entities and reads
out the moisture attribute for each of them. In addition, the notification is is marked as persistent and sticky so
that I cannot simply swipe it away on my mobile phone.
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action:
- service: notify.mobile_app_nokia_9
data:
message: >-
{% for state in states.plant -%} {{ state.name }}
{{state.attributes.moisture|int}}{{state.attributes.unit_of_measurement_dict.moisture}}<br>
{%- endfor %}
title: Pflanzenstatus
data:
persistent: true
sticky: true
tag: pflanzenstatus
- service: input_boolean.turn_on
target:
entity_id: input_boolean.pflanzenstatus
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At the end, the above-mentioned input_boolean is also set to prevent further executions on the same day.
The resetting of the input_boolean is carried out in a further automation that runs every day at midnight.
A notification with the sticky flag can only be cleared by triggering a message with the body clear_notification.
The same tag must be used for the original notification and the clear message.
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action:
- service: notify.mobile_app_nokia_9
data:
message: clear_notification
data:
tag: pflanzenstatus
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This clear message is triggered by an NFC tag on my balcony door. Since this is the only way to
get rid of the notification, I am forced to go near the plants.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)