AI Gardening Advice Is Everywhere. Much of It Is Wrong.

“Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links.”

Maybe you bought seeds for a bright purple hosta you saw on social media, but it never sprouted. Or you built a tower of milk crates to grow potatoes, but ended up with just a few measly spuds. You just don’t have a green thumb, right?

Actually, you may have been fooled by AI.

In the last year, AI-generated content, including gardening advice and inspiration, has exploded. “It’s never been easier, faster, or cheaper to generate sensational, eye-catching garbage content and to share it with millions and millions of people,” says horticulturist Stacey Hirvela, marketing manager for Proven Winners ColorChoice Shrubs. “Gardening misinformation, such as using pennies to turn hydrangeas blue or treating Epsom salts like a miracle fertilizer, is spreading faster than ever.”

Unfortunately, much of the content that’s liked, shared, and re-shared could be bogus entirely or, at the very least, missing important context. “A tip could be totally right for Zone 5 but really wrong in Zone 10,” says Justin Hancock, horticulturist with Costa Farms. “Or advice could be accurate for one species, but totally off for another species in that same genus.”

Understanding more about how fake AI gardening content is created and promoted can save you time and money.

Is AI Ruining Gardening? The biggest problems with AI gardening

Do fake plants or bad gardening advice really cause harm? Experts say it’s more damaging than you might assume.

It sets you up to fail.

If you’re a new gardener, you don’t know what you don’t know. That makes fake or hyped-up advice more difficult to spot. “There are all of these videos created only to collect views,” says Gary Pilarchik, author of The Modern Homestead Garden and The Rusted Garden. “They portray a fake garden, with symmetrical vegetables and no soil spilling over when you fill a container. But if you try these things in a non-AI garden, it doesn’t work, and you get frustrated.”

You waste money.

Blue hostas or rainbow roses? They don’t exist, but it’s easy for swindlers using AI images to set up websites that sell these things—and there’s no recourse when it inevitably doesn’t work. “If you try to get your money back, the company has disappeared without a trace,” says Hirvela of the potential fallout from these schemes.

It’s unethical.

Unscrupulous people use AI to generate “new” garden content by copying transcripts from professional gardeners and posting them on another site with few tweaks. “In this case, we’re incentivizing theft because views equals money,” says Nate Muri, founder of Garden Like a Viking and Viking Growing System. Plus, there’s no accountability behind AI channels. “I have to look people in the eye, so to speak, and stand behind what I’m saying,” says Muri. “But there’s no real person behind AI content. You can’t email AI and say ‘your advice is rubbish. My plants all died.'”

It may limit access to trustworthy information.

Many gardening experts have stopped creating new posts. “We were able to calculate that 600,000 bots were scraping my site for information per month,” says Stephanie Rose, author of The Wild & Free Garden and founder of Garden Therapy. “Some people are calling this the death of the Internet because creators are going out of business or turning to subscription services to provide information to readers and viewers. There’s no more free sharing of knowledge.”

Is AI Ruining Gardening? How to tell if garden content is AI-generated

There are a few ways to winnow out the fake information, albeit it can take some practice.

The plants or gardens are too perfect. If there’s no mud or mess, it’s probably AI. Gardening, by nature, is dirty.

Long, rambling videos promise garden “secrets” that never come. This is likely a tactic to keep you engaged longer without actually delivering on any tangible advice, says Pilarchik.

No questions are answered in the comment section. Human creators often interact with readers or followers; AI creators or content either fall silent, “speaks” in an awkward manner, or is overly optimistic—e.g., “I tried what you said and grew 50 pounds of carrots!,” says Muri, as an example of hyperbolic feedback.

It seems too good to be true. “This applies to outrageous size/scale, color of the flowers, foliage, or fruit, and of course, outrageous shapes,” says Hirvela, “If they existed, don’t you think they’d be all over grocery stores and farmers’ markets?”

Is AI Ruining Gardening? How to spot reliable gardening information

Want to get legit info? Use these tips from humans.

Support real creators. They’re passionate about sharing their knowledge. Podcasts and livestream events are another good way to get information from professional gardeners, says Pilarchik.

Use reverse image search. If an image looks iffy or surreal, use a site like tineye.com to paste the photo of the questionable plant. “If it comes up nowhere on the internet but social media websites or shady-looking e-commerce sites, it’s fake,” says Hirvela.

Rely on university and organization websites. When looking up a potentially fake plant or bogus gardening claim, add site:.edu or site:.org to the end of your keyword or phrase query to limit search results to these types of reputable sites, says Hirvela.

Be cautious of “unique” plants. If you’re buying something on a marketplace site, look at the seller’s other items. “If they’re offering seeds and they’re also selling a bunch of other random stuff, that’s usually a dead giveaway that they are not selling anything valid,” says Hirvela.

Talk to your neighbors. Now’s the time to chat up your neighbor with the expertly manicured lawn or seek out the folks at the local garden club. Connecting with your community and asking friendly gardeners questions is a great place to seek helpful advice, says Rose.

Shop local nurseries. “So much of your success in choosing and caring for plants depends on your unique climate and growing conditions, so don’t neglect the power of shopping local,” says Hirvela.

Eliminate AI from searches. Type your search term, then the minus sign. For example, “how to grow tomatoes -AI,” which will show you primary sources instead of a summary that may include AI-generated content.

is ai killing gardening

Just_Super – Getty Images

How to safely and responsibly use AI in gardening

AI isn’t all bad. You just want to know how to harness its powers appropriately.

Use it as a starting point. If you’re looking for garden planning ideas or plant recommendations, AI may offer suggestions you haven’t thought of. “You just need to remember to take the info with a grain of salt and validate what it gives you via more reliable sources,” says Hancock.

Identify plants. “AI-based plant ID apps have come a long way since they debuted, and while they still aren’t perfect, they do a surprisingly good job these days,” says Hirvela. (PlantNet and iNaturalist are two options.)

Experiment with design sites. “I’ve seen some pretty good garden-planning applications that use AI where you put in your requirements, measurements, site info, and so on, and it spits out a plan,” says Hancock. “I wouldn’t just take that plan straight to the garden center, but with some tweaks and validation, it may help you end up with something nice.”

Remember it’s not foolproof. AI doesn’t consider all the intricacies of garden planning with all its variables. For example, an AI tool may give you a planting list, but can’t assess microclimates around your property, such as radiant heat coming off your house. Use it as a planning tool, but talk to a real person to evaluate its practicality in a real setting. At the end of the day, “AI is good at things with definitive answers, but poor at things that require nuance, context, and most importantly, direct experience,” says Hirvela.