PlantFiles: Red Pitaya, Strawberry Pear, Night blooming Cereus, Queen of the Night, Honolulu Queen
Hylocereus undatus

Another exotic plant for me to play with! I'm surprised that there's very little said about the fruits. I got a fruit from the grocery store; the fruit tastes kind of like a blend of strawberry and kiwi. Hylocereus is commonly sold in stores, as the base of grafted cacti. I bought one of these grafted cacti, and the base sent out another stem which I cut off, and planted in half soil, half sand. The cutting has rooted and doubled in size in a year, but it's still under a foot high. Hoping to see it bloom in the distant future.

I love this plant..it took few years to show off the flowers, but wow! once it did I was pleased...finally I found out what it was (thanks to you all) and now I know it's a climber...for a while I thought i had some weird climbing cactus . The flowers are huge! and it's thriving here in the Houston area.

This plant also goes by the common names of: Dragon Fruit; Chak-wob; Chacam; Junco Tapatío; Pitahaya; Pitahaya Orejona; Zacamb; Tasajo; Reina de la Noche & Queen of the Night.
It is documented to reach 16ft long.

I have mine on the southeast wall of my house. Produces delicious dragonfruit...now being made into drinks.

Nativeplantfan9 if it grows wild in Polk County (zone 9a) surely it would grow wild in Orange(9b/10a) and Osceola (9b)counties ...doesn't it?

3 weeks ago I visited the 'rare plant nursery' in Northern New South Wales. There I accquired amongst other tropical fruit a 'red deagon fruit'. At home. I ate half of it, found it delicious, and scooped out the other half with its numerous pinhead sized black seeds. Just for the heck of it I mixed that pulp with a cupful of fine sand to distibute it evenly and then spread it into a tray of seed raising soil. One week later I noticed the seeds to be sprouting and by now the little plants are about 1//2 in, still only bilobate. I am curious, what next.
Regards Bernd

This snake-like, night-blooming cactus is a climber that can reach as high as 50 or even 60 feet in the wild or in the U.S. from zones 9 southward, and especially in my zone 10 area. Here in south Florida, I regularily see it climbing up people's trees in their yard and even in the wild such as on trees as high as 50 feet - up to the very top of the tree - with many blooms - many open, many closed - and many green, snake-like stems, climbing up and hanging from the tree - around abandoned buildings or on vacant land in trees, from the ground up, sometimes even totally in the tree, climbing downwards or upwards at the top. There is one I saw in Lake Worth, zone 10a, also in southeast Florida, that was climbing into a tall slash pine on a parcel of vacant land, seeming to smother the tree - it was possibly as long as 40 ft. up in that tree! This species may be considered invasive for that reason from zones 9 in the U.S., notably Florida, southward, and should possibly be kept under control as it is often a rapid grower that may climb and smother even tall trees as high as 50 feet. However, the white flowers are very beautiful - especiallly when they bloom at night. This cactus has lots of new, closed, large flowers at the same time and is a profilic bloomer at night - it may get as many as 20 flowers or more possibly all at the same time! The flowers are large and attractive and look just like the pictures for this plant shows. It is a very interesting but possibly invasive cactus - however, it is great to grow and fast-growing, but should be kept under control if grown in south and central Florida!

MORE FACTS - Grows well in zones 9a, 9b, 10a, 10b, 11 and below. It is established in many counties in central and southern Florida (including the Keys), including Hillsborough, Polk, Pinellas, Manatee, Sarasota, Charlotte, Lee, Seminole, Brevard, Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin, Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade and the Keys (Monroe County). This viney, treelike-thicket-forming, nightblooming cactus also grows in the Bahamas, Caribbean, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

I grow this plant in a pot. i'd love to try it in the ground but as of yet move it close in on the porch during the winter's coldest time.

This cactus grows in zone 10a and b quite well, too. Some excellent examples in Southern California which doesn't have any zone 11.

The term 'Red Pitaya' is a bit misleading. 'Red' applies only to the skin color, as opposed to the red flesh that is in Hylocereus polyrhizus, Hylocereus ocamponis, H. guatemalensis, and several others. 'Yellow Pitaya' Selenicereus megalanthus is another example where 'Yellow' applies to the color of the skin, only. Israel has done much research on growing various pitaya (aka 'Dragon Fruit' and pitahaya) in the Negev Desert. There is at least one newsgroup, Pitaya Fruit, [HYPERLINK@groups.yahoo.com]

Leo