Hello. This question is mainly geared towards blueberries and some vegetables. I would like to know if a bit of light at night will effect fruiting of fruits or vegetables such as blueberries, strawberries, tomato, melons, etc.. I live in a small city and my garden plot will be located near an alley that see's a few vehicles every night. Will be vehicles headlights mess up fruiting in fruits or vegetables? I want to plant some blueberry, tomato, strawberry, melons etc.. My plan is to make a small raised bed for the strawberries, and I can cover this at night with a tarp if needed. I wouldn't be able to cover the blueberries at night due to their 5ft-8ft size. I'm really wanting to plant blueberries for the nice fall/winter colors and of course to eat the delicious fruit. I also want to plant some blueberries in a row to take the place of an old rotten wooden fence. However the neighbors back porch light is only about 15-20 feet away from where I want to plant. Sometimes they have the light on late at night for a few hours around midnight or after. I mainly want to plant in that spot for landscaping, blueberry plants have nice fall/winter colors and flair that I'm looking for. But if a bit of stray light will hinder or offset fruiting then I'll probably just replace the fence with another fence. Thanks for reading
I don't think the light will cause a problem. I live out in the country and have a dusk to dawn security light that is on all night. It is quite bright and doesn't seem to stop anything growing.
Our crops pretty well all are summer fruiting/flowering anyway, so a light interrupting the dark night period would only reinforce the short nights anyway (it is actually the length of dark that plants respond to, not length of light). As well, I haven't heard of any common food plants that are extremely sensitive to light such as you're describing. On the other hand, poinsettias will fail to set flower buds if even a very brief light flash occurs during the required long night initiation period...this is why growers use special blackout curtains for this crop.
