Privacy Policy

Service	When	What it receives
US National Weather Service (api.weather.gov)	When the weather screen loads	Your garden's approximate location, rounded to about 1 km
Iowa Environmental Mesonet, Iowa State University	Radar map and "past 7 days" rain	For radar: which map tiles to draw (a broad area). For rain history: the code of the nearest airport weather station
Apple (Maps and location services)	Showing the radar map, turning your location into a "City, State" label, and searching for a store on your wish list	Your location, the map area, or the text you typed, handled under Apple's own privacy policy
Apple (Visual Look Up)	Only when you choose to identify a plant in a photo	Apple's own system feature does the identifying. Apple says that when Visual Look Up is used, limited information is sent to Apple and is not linked to your Apple Account. We receive nothing.
Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons	When a plant photo is shown	The plant's scientific name
GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility) and Wikidata	When you type three or more letters in the Glossary's plant search, or in the plant-name field when adding or editing a plant, the app also looks the name up in an online plant database as you type	The text you typed in that field
Biodiversity Heritage Library	When you open Vintage Plates	The plant's scientific name

We do not control how these services keep their own request logs. Each has its own privacy policy. None of them receives anything from your garden records other than the plant name or approximate location listed above.

Android. The Android app does not connect to the internet. It has no weather, radar, online plant photos or online plant search today. Nothing leaves your device. Some screens offer a link that opens a web page in your phone's browser; that page is then outside the app.

Scanning a plant tag (iPhone). "Scan a plant tag" reads the printed words on a tag with your camera. The reading is done on your phone. The picture is not kept and is not sent anywhere.

4. Location

Location is optional.

• On iPhone, the app asks once for "while using" permission, to show local weather, rain and frost warnings, and to pick advice for your region.
• If you say no, type a ZIP code or a city instead. A 5-digit ZIP is looked up entirely on your device from built-in public data and is never sent anywhere. A city name is looked up with Apple's location service (iPhone).
• Your hardiness zone, frost dates and state are looked up on your device from built-in data. On Android this is the only use of location, and it never leaves the device.
• The app saves your garden's location on your device so it does not have to ask again. It saves only an approximate location, rounded to about 1 km.
• On iPhone, location leaves the device only as listed in section 3.
• You can turn off location access at any time in your phone's Settings. On iPhone you can clear the saved location with "Change location" on the weather screen.
• We never track your location in the background.

5. Camera and photos

You add photos in two ways: by choosing them with your phone's own photo picker (the app sees only the photos you pick, not your whole library), or by taking one with the camera from inside the app after you allow camera access.

• Each photo is resized and saved inside the app on your device.
• The app does not upload your photos to us or to anyone. The one exception you control is Apple's Visual Look Up on iPhone (section 3), which runs only when you ask for it.
• A photo you take with the in-app camera stays inside the app. On iPhone, the Home camera screen also offers "Save to Photos"; only if you tap it does the app add a copy to your phone's photo library. It asks for permission to add photos and cannot read your library through that permission.
• When you replace your garden's cover photo, the old one is deleted from your device.
• You can withdraw camera or photo access at any time in your phone's Settings.

6. Reminders and calendar

If you tap to add a care reminder or calendar event, your phone asks your permission first. On iPhone the app then adds the item to your Reminders or to your default calendar. On Android it adds the event to the calendar on your phone.

• The app adds items only when you ask.
• It does not send your reminders or calendar anywhere.
• Whether they sync to other devices depends on your own Reminders and Calendar accounts.
• You can withdraw permission in your phone's Settings.

7. Emails you choose to send us

"Send feedback" and "Report a translation problem" open an email to [email protected] in your own email app. You can also write to [email protected].

• Nothing is sent unless you press Send.
• We receive what you write and your email address.
• We use it only to answer you and improve the app.
• We do not share it, and we do not add it to a mailing list unless you ask us to (see "Launch updates" below).
• We keep these emails for up to 12 months and then delete them. Ask us and we will delete yours sooner.
• Our email is hosted by Google.

Launch updates. Our website has a "Tell me when it launches" button. It opens an email to [email protected] in your own email app; the website itself collects nothing. If you send that email, we keep your email address in our own mailbox and use it only to tell you when PlotAndPetal is ready. We do not sell it, share it or use it for anything else. Reply "remove" or write to us at any time and we will take you off the list within 10 business days. We delete the list within 30 days after the last launch announcement has gone out. This list is for adults; please do not sign up if you are under 13.

8. Children

PlotAndPetal is a general gardening app and is not directed to children under 13. The app has no accounts, and we do not knowingly receive personal information from children. If you believe a child has emailed us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.

9. How long data is kept, and how to delete it

• On your device: your data stays until you delete it.
• Recently Deleted. Deleting a plant, log entry or area moves it to Recently Deleted, so a mistake can be undone.
• Permanent delete. From Recently Deleted you can delete items permanently, one at a time or all at once, after a confirmation. Permanent deletion also removes their photos and cannot be undone.
• Automatic clean-up. You can set Recently Deleted to clean itself up automatically after 30 or 90 days. The default is to keep items until you delete them.
• Delete everything at once. Settings > Delete all my data permanently deletes every plant, photo, log entry, bed and setting on your device. This cannot be undone.
• Uninstalling the app removes all its data from that device. Device backups you made before that are handled by Apple, Google, or your computer.
• With us: we hold only the emails you sent us (section 7). Write to us to have them deleted.
• Other services: we cannot delete their request logs, and we do not send them anything that identifies you.

10. Features that are not active yet

None of the following is switched on in the current version. We will update this policy, and ask for your permission in the app where required, before any of them launches.

• Paid photo identification. A photo you choose to scan will be sent through our server to a plant-identification service. You will see a one-time explanation and have to agree before your first scan, and you can turn scanning off later.
• Apple Weather, on iPhone. Forecasts and rain history may come from Apple instead of the National Weather Service, so your approximate location would go to Apple for weather.
• Sync between your own devices. Your garden will be able to sync through your own cloud account. We will not be able to read that data.
• Any future account or subscription. If we add sign-in, you will be able to delete your account and its data from inside the app.
• Our own ads, on the free version. We will not use an advertising network. An ad you are shown will be chosen only from what you are doing inside the app at that moment, for example an ad on the rose page because it is the rose page. Nothing about you is sent outside the app to choose it.

11. Selling or sharing your data

We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with advertisers, data brokers, or anyone else.

When the free version shows our own ads, they will be placed by us, labelled as ads, and shown only inside the app. Nothing about you is sent outside the app to choose them, nothing is linked to data from other companies' apps or websites, and no data broker is involved. This is not "tracking" as Apple defines it, so you will not see a tracking permission prompt.

We may tell a partner a genuinely aggregate figure that identifies no one, for example "most of our users grow roses". Because the apps send us nothing today, we have no such figures today.

12. Contact

Questions, or a request to delete emails you have sent us: [email protected].

13. Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we will post the new version on this page with a new effective date. If a change affects how your information is used, for example when paid photo identification launches, we will tell you in the app before it takes effect.

Browser version (plotandpetal.app)

No accounts, no server. Your garden sample or sandbox data lives only in your browser's own local storage on that device. We cannot see it, and it does not sync anywhere unless a future cloud-sync feature is added and you turn it on.