Sun light creates plants, so arguably every plant’s growth is all about capturing the optimal amount of sun, moisture and nutrients that its particular plant species needs. But conversely, are plants entirely oblivious to moon light? Or can you see in the way some species grow that they also attempt to capture some degree of nocturnal luminescence?
In: Biology
Moonlight is just sunlight reflected off the moon, so it’s not any different than sunlight, it’s just less of it at night. Plants don’t have to do anything special to make use of moonlight, but some actually do fold up at night to protect themselves rather than absorb moonlight which would suggest the protection of folding up is more advantageous than the small amount of energy from the moonlight.
Plants use any light for photosynthesis.
but moonlight is about 100000 times weaker than sunlight, and capturing it is the same as sunlight so no plants optimize for it.
therw is some evidence that they base some cycles on it though and apparently it can impact growth
Moonlight, at its absolute brightest, is about 1/10000th the brightness of a *cloudy* day.
Some plants do flower at night to attract specific pollinators but none probably try to use moonlight to photosynthesize more than accidentally.
Plants tend to shut down their photosynthesis at night and focus on other things, like taking in CO2 – which they don’t do during the day, because it’s hottest and their pores are closed tight to keep water in.
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