Start here: name it in your message
Once HydroGardenAdvisor is connected, say its name in your message and Claude will bring it in. That one habit is the difference between a general answer about hydroponics and an answer built on your own grow, your own reservoir size, and your own crop.
- “Plan a grow setup with HydroGardenAdvisor.”
- “Ask HydroGardenAdvisor to check my plants.”
- “What's in my HydroGardenAdvisor garden right now?”
- “I just harvested — log it in HydroGardenAdvisor.”
After the first mention you can keep going normally; Claude stays with it for the rest of the conversation. If a reply ever looks like generic growing advice — no mention of your garden, no real numbers for your setup — name HydroGardenAdvisor again and ask for the same thing.
What it is
The HydroGardenAdvisor connector links your HydroGardenAdvisor account to Claude, Anthropic's AI assistant. Once connected, Claude can work with your real garden — your active grows, your grow history, your harvest results — instead of answering from general knowledge.
Everything the connector does runs through the same HydroGardenAdvisor service as the mobile app. Grows you start in a conversation appear in the app's Garden; check-ins and harvests you log in the app inform what Claude sees. One account, one garden, wherever you work.
On Claude apps that support interactive cards, results come back as cards right in the conversation — a setup plan, a plant diagnosis, a harvest result, your garden at a glance — instead of a wall of text. On a host that doesn't, everything still works the same way, just as plain text.
What you can do
Plan a grow setup. Tell it the crop and your system type — DWC, Kratky, NFT, Dutch bucket — and get a real setup plan: the photoperiod that actually fits the crop (most kits default to 16 hours, which bolts lettuce that wants 12–14), a nutrient mix scaled to your reservoir size, bolt-resistant cultivar picks where they matter, and what to expect week to week. Setup plans are free and unlimited.
Check your plants. Send a photo mid-grow and get a diagnosis, not a shrug — tip burn, light burn, etiolation, early bolt, root rot, or a real nutrient deficiency, named and prioritized, not a wall of possibilities. Photos can't travel inside a Claude conversation, so HydroGardenAdvisor hands you a private, single-use upload link first — see How photos work below.
Log a harvest. Report how it turned out and get a real assessment: what worked, what to change, and concrete adjustments carried forward into your next cycle for the same crop — so the next setup plan already knows what you learned.
Work your garden. Ask what's actively growing, pull up a past grow's history, compare two harvests of the same crop side by side, or add a note to a grow's journal.
How to connect
You'll need a Claude account (claude.ai) on a plan that supports connectors, and about a minute:
1. In Claude, open Settings → Connectors, search the directory for HydroGardenAdvisor, and add it. (If you'd rather add it by hand, choose Add custom connector and give it the URL https://api.hydrogardenadvisor.app/mcp — same thing.)
2. Claude opens HydroGardenAdvisor's sign-in page. Enter your email — we send an 8-character sign-in code to your inbox. No password to create, no card required.
3. Enter the code, approve the connection, and you're done. If you've used the HydroGardenAdvisor app with the same email, your garden is already there. If you're new, a free account is created on the spot.
Then send your first message with HydroGardenAdvisor in it — see Start here above.
To disconnect at any time, remove HydroGardenAdvisor from Claude's Connectors settings. Access tokens expire on their own.
If Claude isn't using HydroGardenAdvisor
Almost always, it just wasn't asked. Claude decides for itself when to reach for a connector, and a plain question like “what photoperiod does lettuce need?” is one it will happily answer on its own — with general advice, not a plan built on your setup.
Name HydroGardenAdvisor in the message. “Plan a grow with HydroGardenAdvisor” engages it; “plan a grow” often won't. This is the fix roughly every time.
Check it's still connected. Settings → Connectors in Claude. If it's missing, add it again — your garden and history are tied to your account, not the connection, so nothing is lost.
Sign-in code didn't arrive. Check spam. Codes last 15 minutes and can only be used once; start the connection again for a fresh one.
Still stuck? support@hydrogardenadvisor.app — a description of what you asked and what came back is enough to go on.
How photos work
Photos never travel through the conversation. HydroGardenAdvisor hands you a private, single-use link that opens a simple upload page — take a photo or choose one from your library, submit it, then tell Claude you're done and it fetches the diagnosis. Photos are held for at most 15 minutes and deleted as soon as they're analyzed, or when the link expires unused.
Free and Pro
The connector uses the same account and the same limits as the app: setup plans are free and unlimited, every crop. Photo diagnoses and harvest assessments are free 3 times a month each, up to 20 of each in total, then HydroGardenAdvisor Pro — $4.99/month or $39.99/year — makes both unlimited. There's nothing extra to buy for the connector itself; Pro works the same wherever you subscribed.
Privacy
The short version: we receive only what the tools need — the details of each request and the photos you submit through our own upload link. We never see your Claude conversation, and Claude only sees what a tool returns. The full details live in the connector section of our privacy policy.
Questions or trouble
Write to support@hydrogardenadvisor.app. If a sign-in code doesn't arrive, check your spam folder first — codes expire after 15 minutes, and you can always request a fresh one by starting the connection again.