Microchips in lieu of labels
Laura & Dave (Tue, 17 Mar 2015 15:39:16 PDT)

Having worked on a research team that pushed the early development of the RFID
tags, I'm sorry to point out that cheap tags wouldn't work if buried more than a
small fraction of an inch/cm. I'm a bit out of date, but with the frequencies I
was involved with, the soil damps the signals. If the tag antenna was at the
upper end of a long tag, at the surface, then it would work, it would more
likely stay in place, and it would be in the location the bulbs were assigned,
or at least where they were last seen.
Tags are being developed that track and transmit soil moisture, temperature
and other measures, but the tags are on the surface with probes penetrating the
soil.
But who knows what's in the future. I know that I'd dearly love not to have
to write so much information, both on labels and on pots themselves (ha, go
ahead, pull my labels out!!).

Dave