Pick a different market that has more money in it. There's all kinds of water-sensing gadgets out there and not a lot of enthusiasm for them, because it's cheaper to water than to buy a gadget. Here where water is very expensive, I can buy 748 gallons of water for less than $4. Why would I pay more than $1 for something that might save me...$1?

Pick an area where there's plenty of money to be made. Gardens are not that area. Maybe farming operations has more potential.

Ever wonder why there are no garden TV shows in the US? Because there are no advertisers, except maybe Scott's and Miracle Gro, which come to think of it is the same corporation. Why are there no advertisers? Because there's no huge money to be made that isn't already locked in (fertilizer, suppliers of tomato plants to Wal-Mart). About all you can do is explore market-disruption tactics (See "PayPal Mafia" and Musk, Elon), but even then, if you want to make a small fortune in garden gadgets, you have to start with a large fortune.

There's way more money in home stuff, houzz being a great example of that.

My yard is divided into several different zones. Each zone gets a different amount of water, depending on how drought resistant or water thirsty the plants are. My gardener sets the drip timer for, maybe 3 days a week for 4 minutes at a time. If I had something telling me when to water all my plants according to need, I think I might be going crazy with things to do when i least want to do them. Gardening is one of those things that you want automated as much as possible.

I'm not sure if it exists (maybe it does), but something that automatically detects moisture levels and gives the plant water when it needs it is probably a good idea. But if it means getting the owner involved -- not such a good idea.

My property sits on four city lots -- so it's quite a bit to take care of.

It's a nice idea, and I applaud your inventiveness. But I guess you have to own and maintain a large parcel of property to understand the limitations of new applications.

There are already sensors available that turn on irrigation when needed. The drawbacks are that the wires may be damaged during garden maintenance and irrigation may come on unexpectedly, wetting someone working in the garden.

I don't see the market. If it gave you a reminder, you still would need to go to the garden to turn on the valve. Irrigation controllers based on ET work automatically. Some are based on information from a local weather station and some are based on historical data.

It's sort of sad when you are a young person with a lot of enthusiasm to make money with a product, but hoovb is correct. Focus on another product. The Soil Sleuth needs nothing but a twist, and not only does it tell you moisture, it aerates the soil. You are young.

Necessity is the father of invention. Water sensors are not needed. Think! Ask you mom what is needed.

I have an induction cook top. What I need is induction friendly griddles and cookware. Hard to find. But technology forces us to think how we can use it.

No moisture sensors for me. It's unnecessary complexity. I typically set up irrigation systems based on historic ET0 and plant coefficients, but I'm pretty happy so far with Rachio's weekly ET calcs. I check on the soil with a soil core sampler.

Those little plastic sensors would get beat to hell in a garden environment. Kids and gardeners would kick and break them. Just look at how often popup have to be replaced due to damage. They would have to have carbon black in the plastic for UV protection or they wouldn't last a year in SoCal sun. They probably would be useless in aggregate media.