GRAND RAPIDS, Mich., Nov 18, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Rather than guessing the optimal location for house plants to flourish, a new garden tool, SunStick Home detects the light intensity indoors within minutes while sitting as pretty as a flower.
"In order to grow beautiful house plants, you really need to know how many foot-candles of light your plant will receive inside your home," said Kerry VerMeulen, Co-owner of Plumstone, LLC, makers of SunStick (which measures sunlight outdoors) and SunStick Home. "SunStick Home answers that essential question quickly and accurately."
This simple new garden tool resembles a faux flower top and has patented technology that reads or measures the light in its immediate area. Place SunStick Home atop a house plant in the desired location of the home, such as on a table in the living room, and watch the color transformation. Within 20 minutes, the light sensitive flower top changes color and indicates a light reading based on its accompanying color chart.
When using SunStick Home, follow these steps for best results:
-- If there is a window in the room, make sure the sun is not behind a cloud, even if it doesn't shine directly on the plant or in the window.
-- Set the faux flower top right on top of the plant. If a plant isn't selected yet, use stacked books or an upside down vase to get SunStick Home at the approximate plant height.
-- If the room's light varies greatly throughout the day, do two tests at the two greatest variations and average the two readings.
The most important environmental factor in growing plants indoors is adequate light. Light provides the energy source needed for plants to manufacture food, and indoor plants differ greatly in their light intensity requirements. Garden experts classify house plants into one of three categories: low light intensity (75 to 150 foot-candles), medium light intensity (200 to 500 foot-candles), and high light intensity (500 to 1000 foot-candles).
Designed to make interior decorating with plants more cost effective and less time consuming, SunStick Home answers the basic light question in mere minutes and is packaged as a set of three for under eight dollars.