Auk Mini 2 Indoor Smart Garden Review: Better Where It Counts

Auk Mini 2 室内智能花园评测：关键之处更胜一筹

WIRED WIRED 评测

WIRED (Pros): Attractive design, now with more color options. Extremely easy to set up and maintain. Can grow whatever you want. New, less intrusive light with an optional app and vacation mode. Tomato-and-pepper kit with longer dowels available as an add-on. WIRED（优点）： 设计美观，现提供更多配色选择。安装和维护极其简单。可以种植任何你想要的植物。配备了全新的、干扰性更小的灯光，并支持可选的应用程序和度假模式。另有提供加长支架的番茄与辣椒种植套件可供选购。

TIRED (Cons): Lack of pump means potentially stagnant water (but also one less failure point). TIRED（缺点）： 没有水泵意味着水可能会停滞（但这也减少了一个故障点）。

When Auk’s original Mini 1 herb garden hit the market in 2024, it touched on something that many tabletop gardens had until that point failed to consider: If you’re going to give up that much counter or table space, you don’t want it to be for something ugly. 当 Auk 的初代 Mini 1 香草花园于 2024 年上市时，它触及了一个此前许多桌面花园都未能考虑到的痛点：如果你要占用那么大的台面或桌面空间，你肯定不希望它看起来很丑。

Aerogardens and similar models look … fine, but you’re probably not going to see one in the background of an Architectural Digest shoot. The Auk Mini filled that marketplace gap with its pairing of sleek Scandinavian design and utility, transforming the run-of-the-mill herb-growing operation into a conversation piece. Aerogardens 和类似的型号看起来……还行，但你大概不会在《建筑文摘》(Architectural Digest) 的拍摄背景中看到它们。Auk Mini 通过将时尚的斯堪的纳维亚设计与实用性相结合，填补了这一市场空白，将平淡无奇的香草种植变成了一件引人注目的谈资。

When I reviewed the original Auk Mini last fall, I loved that it allowed users to plant their own seeds in widely available coco coir, an alternative to peat moss made from coconut husks. No proprietary pods, no subscriptions, no fussy app. 去年秋天我评测初代 Auk Mini 时，我很喜欢它允许用户使用市面上常见的椰糠（一种由椰子壳制成的泥炭藓替代品）来种植自己的种子。无需专用种植盒，无需订阅，也没有繁琐的应用程序。

When I started testing the brand-new Auk 2 earlier this summer, I wondered what new features could possibly justify a new model. Turns out, there was more room for improvement than I thought. 今年夏天早些时候，当我开始测试全新的 Auk 2 时，我还在想，到底有什么新功能值得推出一个新机型。事实证明，它的改进空间比我想象的要大得多。

For the uninitiated, Auk (pronounced “owk”) is a Norwegian company that released its first garden, the Auk 1, in 2021. Essentially a larger version of the Mini 1, the Auk 1 received mixed reviews online for its tower water reservoir and inconsistent light and watering cycles. (In fact, a former WIRED director tested it and became so frustrated that he threw it in the trash.) 对于不了解的人来说，Auk（发音为“owk”）是一家挪威公司，于 2021 年发布了其首款花园产品 Auk 1。Auk 1 本质上是 Mini 1 的放大版，但因其塔式储水箱以及不稳定的光照和浇水周期，在网上收到了褒贬不一的评价。（事实上，一位前 WIRED 总监在测试后感到非常沮丧，直接把它扔进了垃圾桶。）

The Mini 1 was a simplified version of the Auk system, with four oval pots set over a 3-liter reservoir. Users could grow the included herb seeds or anything else they wanted in the pots using coco coir. It was simple, stylish, and effective. Mini 1 是 Auk 系统的简化版，在 3 升的储水箱上方设有四个椭圆形花盆。用户可以使用椰糠在花盆中种植附带的香草种子或任何他们想要的植物。它简单、时尚且高效。

The Auk Mini 2 features a handful of updates, but perhaps the most visible is that it comes in new color variations, rather than just black and white. There are still the oak and walnut wood bottoms, but Mini 2 offers beech and ash instead of the Mini 1’s cork. Espresso, sage, and terra-cotta colored tops now join the menu of offerings. Auk Mini 2 进行了多项更新，但最显眼的或许是它提供了新的配色，不再局限于黑白两色。底座依然有橡木和胡桃木材质，但 Mini 2 用山毛榉木和白蜡木取代了 Mini 1 的软木。浓缩咖啡色、鼠尾草绿和陶土色的顶盖也加入了可选清单。

The Mini 2 also sports bigger plant pots and a 25 percent larger water capacity, despite its overall footprint being 12 percent smaller than the original. Mini 2 还配备了更大的花盆和容量增加 25% 的水箱，尽管其整体占地面积比初代产品缩小了 12%。

There is now also—and I admittedly had mixed feelings about this—an app. Using the Auk Connect app isn’t mandatory; you can still control the light schedule manually using a button on the light bar, as with the Auk Mini 1. The app doesn’t add much, but to its credit, it’s easy to set up. You don’t even need to make an account. Just download it; open it; and choose your garden, which the app should already recognize. You’ll access a page where you can turn the light on or off, dim it, set a time schedule, or swap grow mode from “Herbs & Salads” to “Fruits & Veggies.” 现在还有一个应用程序——我承认对此心情复杂。使用 Auk Connect 应用程序并非强制；你仍然可以像在 Auk Mini 1 上那样，通过灯条上的按钮手动控制光照时间。这个应用程序并没有增加太多功能，但值得称赞的是，它设置起来很简单。你甚至不需要注册账号。只需下载、打开，然后选择你的花园，应用程序应该会自动识别。你将进入一个页面，在那里可以开关灯光、调节亮度、设置时间表，或者将生长模式从“香草与沙拉”切换为“水果与蔬菜”。

Though the stock dowels for the light bar on the Mini 2 are, as on the Mini 1, too low at a maximum of 15 inches to easily accommodate taller fruiting plants like peppers, Auk now offers a $39 Chili & Tomato Kit with longer dowels and a tray with larger pots (two instead of three). I have not tried it, but I’d be surprised if it didn’t result in substantially increased success rates. 虽然 Mini 2 灯条的标配支架和 Mini 1 一样，最高仅 15 英寸，难以轻松容纳像辣椒这样较高的结果植物，但 Auk 现在提供了一款售价 39 美元的“辣椒与番茄套件”，包含更长的支架和一个带有更大花盆（两个而非三个）的托盘。我还没有试用过，但如果它不能显著提高种植成功率，我会感到很惊讶。

The app also allows you to select the Mini 2’s brand-new vacation mode feature, which it calls Slow Mode. On Slow Mode, the Mini 2’s lights dim to slow down growth and water absorption so that, if you need to step away, you’re not left with a mess of overgrown parsley和 bolting basil, as happened when I tested the Mini 1. 该应用程序还允许你选择 Mini 2 的全新度假模式功能，即“慢速模式”(Slow Mode)。在慢速模式下，Mini 2 的灯光会变暗，以减缓植物生长和水分吸收。这样，如果你需要外出，就不会像我测试 Mini 1 时那样，回来面对一堆过度生长的欧芹和抽薹的罗勒。

Let There Be (Better) Light 让光照（变得更好）

For comparison purposes, I grew the same herbs in the Mini 2 as I did in the Mini 1: Italian parsley and Genovese basil. I also used only the included nutrients. However, once the parsley and basil got to harvestable size, I noticed something different: These herbs were not leggy. In fact, they were lush and bushy, just like the marketing photos, with almost none of the floppiness that plagued my plants when I tested the earlier model. 为了进行对比，我在 Mini 2 中种植了与 Mini 1 相同的香草：意大利欧芹和热那亚罗勒。我也只使用了附带的营养液。然而，当欧芹和罗勒长到可以采摘的大小时，我注意到了一些不同：这些香草并没有徒长。事实上，它们长得郁郁葱葱、枝繁叶茂，就像营销照片里那样，几乎没有我在测试旧型号时遇到的那种软塌塌的问题。

This result was, I learned, due in part to the Mini 2’s new light bar incorporating an optical lens system that allows the light to not only appear less bright, but also focus more light directly on the plants. Because the plants now get enough light, they don’t have to stretch toward it—which caused overly tall, weak stems in the Mini 1. 我了解到，这一结果部分归功于 Mini 2 的新灯条采用了光学透镜系统，这不仅使灯光看起来不那么刺眼，还能将更多的光线直接聚焦在植物上。由于植物现在获得了充足的光照，它们不必为了追光而伸长——这正是导致 Mini 1 植物茎秆过高且脆弱的原因。

I also noticed that less of the light spills over into the surrounding area—I kept the Auk Mini 2 on a console table behind the couch in my living room, and unlike the lights on most gardens I test, it wasn’t visually disruptive while I watched TV. In fact, the light was so visibly dim (in a good way) that I nearly forgot it was on. 我还注意到，溢散到周围区域的光线更少了——我把 Auk Mini 2 放在客厅沙发后的玄关桌上，与我测试过的大多数花园灯光不同，它在看电视时不会造成视觉干扰。事实上，灯光非常柔和（这是件好事），以至于我差点忘了它还开着。

Another possible contributing factor to the plants’ ability to stay upright was the starter kit’s new addition of a topper: a bag of fine gravel that forms a sort of crust over the top of the coco coir as the substrate absorbs water. None of the herb stems struggled to pop through, though some wore a little gravel hat for quite a while. Once they were big enough to stand upright, they stayed that way. The gravel was a little bit of a mess to apply, but I don’t advise skipping this step. 植物能够保持挺拔的另一个可能因素是入门套件中新增的覆盖物：一袋细砾石。当基质吸收水分时，它会在椰糠表面形成一层外壳。所有的香草茎秆都能轻松穿过，尽管有些在很长一段时间里头上还顶着一小块砾石。一旦它们长得足够大可以直立，它们就能保持那种姿态。铺设砾石时会弄得有点乱，但我建议不要跳过这一步。

Best to Buy Now 现在购买最合适

Otherwise, the Mini Auk 1 and Mini Auk 2 are quite similar. They have an identical tension assembly for the light bar; the same little dot-studded water-level indicator wheel (seen above), where the red dot me… 除此之外，Mini Auk 1 和 Mini Auk 2 非常相似。它们拥有完全相同的灯条张力组件；以及同样带有圆点标记的水位指示轮（见上图），当红点……