Bond 9629 3 Way Garden Soil Meter Moisture Light pH

- Measures; Moisture, Light, and PH - No batteries needed - Indoor or outdoor use - Charts included on back

User Ratings and Reviews

2 Stars Not sure if it really works
Ours broke after 2 years. We kept it clean and did not abuse it. Needle seemed to fail. Ph results were either pinned at 3 to 3.5 or 6.5. I think the former is because I nuked the poor blueberry plant with a few cups of sulfur. So there might be user error. Regardless, I think I got what I paid for. I plan to buy a much more expensive one (do a search for soil ph meters on Amazon).

3 Stars pH meter busted
The light and moisture meters are really useful and work perfectly, but the pH meter never leaves 7.5 or so, not even in coffee or vinegar or soap...

3 Stars Variable Accuracy
pH: I'm a biochemistry major at UMaine and I've often used high-end pH meters, which require very sensitive electrodes. This just uses two metal prongs, but I've found it to be accurate enough for soil testing.

light: the light meter on mine must be broken or I'm not using it correctly - perhaps I need to use it in direct sunlight because it's not registering much under my UV grow lights. That said, light intensity is something that doesn't usually require a meter to figure out. You can usually get a good estimate just by looking or reading local forecasts for your region.

moisture: the key with these meters is that they have to pass an electric current between the electrodes (the prongs) and pure water or even tap water from the faucet doesn't usually contain enough ions to conduct a strong current. You would probably not get any reaction from one of these types of meters by placing the prongs under a source of running water. If you pour a cup of water and place the prongs in there, that will probably show up on the meter. However, what it really needs is the ions contained in the soil to propagate a strong current and therefore an accurate reading (just for fun, add salt to your cup of water and then see the needle max out - the salt forms ions in the water). I've been using this meter in soil tests and it very accurately reads the moisture level.

1 Star Not so great
I held this under running water and it still did not register "wet." So, I don't know how I can trust it to test the moisture in the soil.

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