What are the differences between the fruit producing varieties from Hylocereus?

[gr33ntea]

Hello everyone, i have recently been interested in Pitaya's from the Hylocereus family

I have done some lurking and from what i have gathered in the order least tastiest to most tastiest they are


1. red fruit with white flesh - Good (from hylocereus Undatus)
2. red fruit with red/pink flesh - Very Good (from hylocereus Undatus)
3. yellow fruit with white flesh - Very Very good (from hylocereus grandiflorus)

Now i am wondering what are the differences in the actual plant between these Hylocereus cacti?

These are specifically what i have been looking for the past hour

Are there any differences with the Undatus plants that produce the two different type of fruit?
Does grandiflorus branches grow wider and bigger?
Does undatus produce fruit with no glochids on it while another variety of hylocereus undatus does?
Does grandiflorus have bigger spikes? Is it woodier?
Does undatus produce more fruit?

i have found out that grandiflorus produces bigger flowers and bigger fruits
I am very curious what the difference are with the actual plant,? I am looking for a Hylocereus that i can get fruit from as well as maybe use as grafting stock.

Thanks for your time and any help.

[shortly]

You will only get 1 "type" of fruit per clone, any variation in the fruit will be purely environmental.

Yellow fruit with white flesh will be Selenicereus grandiflorus it does not have glochids as such (only Opuntiacae have glochids), most clones do however have spines that are retained up until the fruit ripens when they are shed.

Grandiflorus tends to be smaller, thinner stemmed & often slightly pricklier depending on the clone. It does not seem to get as woody as many Hylo's but it is a much smaller plant. The fruit are smaller than the average hylo fruit but IMO are much better flavor & of good texture. Unfortunately it is often over looked as a commercial crop because of its smaller fruit size, handling issues & lower yields despite being a superior tasting fruit, at the end of the day its $'s per acre return that counts.

Hylocereus undatus : there are hundreds of different clones around with new ones being selected from seedlings every year so unless you have a variety name there is no way of saying exactly what the character of each plant would be sight unseen as they are all slightly different.

They are all suitable as root stocks to varying degrees, it will come down to your growing conditions & what your scions are?

Your best course of action is probably to plant up several clones and select the few that do well under your conditions, are suited as rootstocks and you like their fruit.

Or plant out seed and select your own varieties?

[zelly]

Yellow fruit with white flesh will be Selenicereus grandiflorus

huh?

yellow fruit, white flesh = Hylocereus megalanthus

[hostilis]

I've heard the yellow fruit being called selenicereus megalanthus and hylocereus megalanthus. Synonyms. S. grandiflorus definitely isn't the big yellow dragonfruit though.

[woof woof woof]

Gr33ntea have a look at these cultivars www.tropicalfruitnursery.com/dragon/index.htm < if the link doesn't work google it. for some reason it did not allow me to copy/paste the link. Will give you an idea of some of the cultivars out there.

The H. Undatus ones have allot of variety between them,... the red ones are usually the sweeter and therefor the better tasting ones. I'm sold on the red fleshed ones.

Have yet to find a white fleshed H.Undatus that I really like,.... I haven't tasted many of them, so I can't say if there are white fleshed ones I really like. So far I find the white fleshed Undatus mainly bland in taste.

From what I gather online is that the pink ones can be almost as sweet as some of the red cultivars, but usually the pink cultivars fall somewhere in between the red and white ones when it comes to taste/sweetness.

With dragon fruit it usually comes down to "the sweeter the better", but there are subtleties in taste as well.

The Yellow ones "Selinicereus Megalanthus" simply rock!! Very sweet, more like candy than fruit to me. ;-)

The Israelies have developed a few strains that should be really interesting to you Ausies,... for the fact that they have been developed with harsh (Negev) desert conditions, good production and good taste and good shelf life in mind. I read that their top Cultivar is called "Venus" < this may be old info.

[Dreamwalker.]

I thought the yellow dragon was hylocereus Undatus or hylocereus Undatus x selen.meg.....???

I have never heard of hylocereus grandiflorus...but hylocereus & selenicereus often seem to be interchanged eg
hylocereus megalanthus

so I wonder if you grow the seeds from the yellow one ..how many plants you'd need to obtain a yellow fruiter?

[gr33ntea]

Ok From what i have gathered after reading the information you guys posted

Hylocereus Megalanthus or Selenecereus Megalanthus

Produces yellow dragon fruit with white flesh. Very Very Sweet

This variety is the only one known from the genus Selenicereus.
It differs from the Hylocereus in color, harvesting time, and this fruit has thorns that occur on the fruit itself. The fruit are small to medium usually weighing 0.23-0.34 kgs. The fruit ripen from late November to February, and it is certainly among the sweetest and tastiest of all the dragon fruit. This variety is self pollinating, and it will set fruit on its own.

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Hylocereus polyrhizus

Produces pink dragon fruit with red flesh. Very Sweet
The taste of the red flesh variety is sweeter than white flesh and the after taste is great as well.
Apparently it has more nutrients in it than white flesh.
If you eat a lot of this fruit your urine and stools will be red The color comes from natural pigments known as hylocerenin and isohylocerenin and is also known to have natural florescent property.

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Hylocereus Undatus

Produces pink dragon fruit with white flesh. Sweet

Apparently not that tasty, some people bitch about it and say it can be bitter and only has a vague melon taste. Most people say it is yummy but the red flesh taste better.

So now my question is what king of fruit does Selenecereus grandifloros produce?

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Hylocereus Grandiflorus (Maybe this is the same as Selenecereus Megalanthus ^ )

Large-flowered Cactus
"Grandiflorus tends to be smaller, thinner stemmed & often slightly pricklier"
"The fruit are smaller than the average hylo fruit but IMO are much better flavor & of good texture."
" It does not seem to get as woody as many Hylo's but it is a much smaller plant"
- Shortly


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The names get interchanged a lot. The plant itself are very similar to each other, vigorous growers, small spines...

Hylocereus undatus : there are hundreds of different clones around with new ones being selected from seedlings every year so unless you have a variety name there is no way of saying exactly what the character of each plant would be sight unseen as they are all slightly different.

So now my question is: Is Hylocereus Undatus and Hylocereus polyrhizus self pollinating?

I am slowly coming to the conclusion that i should get Hylocereus polyrhizus. Fruit is good, plant grows bigger and yields more than the yellow skin white flesh dragonfruit producing variety.

[zelly]

I'm of the opinion it really doesnt matter what you get. I live in an area with huge ethnic populations of peoples who grow these plants in their home countries, as well as in their gardens here and for every 100 linear feet of plants there might be 1-2 fruits. I see these plants in gardens all over, some people have their whole yards set up for dragonfruit. But strangely, one rarely sees fruit on their plants, mine included.

One megalantus fruit in 5 years.......

[shortly]

huh?

yellow fruit, white flesh = Hylocereus megalanthus

Ahhhh bugger brain fart on my part, that should have said Selenicereus megalanthus.

And to cap it off i was doing up a seed order when i was typing the above so i now have 250 S megalanthus seeds on their way when i actually wanted S grandiflorus seeds Goddammit

The only issue i have getting megalanthus to set fruit is stopping rouge gardeners from lopping its limbs, although granted they only produce a tenth of what even a fairly ordinary Hylo will.

Zelly If the plants around you are only producing 1-2 fruits per 100' then perhaps most of the Hylo's here may be from selected commercial heavy cropping varieties? Most of the ones i have and have seen about certainly produce a LOT more fruit than that.

Edited August 8, 2014 by shortly

[hostilis]

I would guess that climate has a lot to do with fruiting. People in dry hot climates might not get as many fruits as people in humid moderate climates. Not sure if that's accurate, but just guessing.

[woof woof woof]

Hylocereus spp are probably quite adaptable.

I live in a semi arid climate in the tropics and I get quite a few H. Polyrhizus flowers because it is not self fertile I do not get fruits yet. That should soon be a thing of the past. I would say that from a 4 year old plant I've been getting 15 flowers each time it rains after a dry period. I get around 2 to 3 flushes of flowers a year. So if I pollinate them I think I will get the same amount of fruits.

[gr33ntea]

Hylocereus spp are probably quite adaptable.

I live in a semi arid climate in the tropics and I get quite a few H. Polyrhizus flowers because it is not self fertile I do not get fruits yet.

Oh shit.... so H. Polyrhizus is not self fertile?

[Dreamwalker.]

if dragons are performing so badly in cooler temps....maybe you should be growing cereus...multi cropper in temperate climate...1/2 doz fruits per stick

[Philocacti]

I tried the red fruit with white flesh and I didn't like it at all,

[shortly]

I've 3 H polyrhizus clones and 1 is clone is self fertile, although i'm told it produces larger fruit if it is cross pollinated. Cant verify this just yet but it sounded plausible

[gr33ntea]

Found this gem

"Varieties of pink dragon fruit that do not require cross-pollination and are suitable for home gardens include American Beauty (Hylocerus guatemalensis), which has pink skin with light green scales and flavorful, dark pink fruit. Hylocerus undatus varieties include Cosmic Charlie, which tastes like a grape crossed with a kiwi fruit; Dark Star, which has a subtle grape flavor; and Halleys Comet (H. undatus x H. polyrhizus), which has deep pink, sweet flesh. Purple Haze (H. undatus) is another dragon fruit that tastes like grape mixed with kiwi."

Read more : http://www.ehow.com/info_8004855_varieties-selfpollinating-dragon-fruit.html

[Dreamwalker.]

and that's just the beginning.............think of the possibilities of creating your own awesome flavours/colours/form, via cross pollinating, inter/intra-specific hybrids, cloneing....

[Optimystic]

according to this they use advanced pollination techniques on some dragonfruit farms

alot of other good info too

"In Mexico and Central America, several

Hylocereus species are grown in family orchards

using basic technology. Meanwhile, Israel,

Malaysia, Thailand and the United States use

advanced technology resulting in high yields,

particularly in Israel, where yields up to 40 t ha-1 of

fruit are harvested (Mizrahi & Nerd, 1999)."

it goes on to get into more detail and discusses some of the findings

http://comunicata.ufpi.br/index.php/comunicata/article/viewFile/334/151

Edited August 10, 2014 by Spine Collector

[gr33ntea]

"In Type I self-pollination, pollen is transferred from the anther to the stigma of the same flower. Such flowers are hermaphrodites, which have both sexes.

In Type II pollen is transferred from the anther of one flower to the stigma of another flower from the same plant."

Does anyone know what type of pollination Hylocereus is?

and that's just the beginning.............think of the possibilities of creating your own awesome flavours/colours/form, via cross pollinating, inter/intra-specific hybrids, cloneing....

Mmmmm i want to do that. Create some kind of freak

[gr33ntea]

" In the Hylocereus spp., H. polyrhizus and H. costaricensis were self-unfruitful, and cross-pollination with other species led to high fruit set (100%).
Hylocereus undatus was self-fruitful, setting fruit with self-pollen. "

- http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/content/29/12/1487.full.pdf

Well damn there is my answer...

I think someone here mentioned that H polyrhizus and H undatus hybrids set fruit with self pollen?

[gr33ntea]

Hylocereus guatemalensis 'American Beauty': The fruit has an impressive appearance both inside and out, and it has the flavor to back up its good looks. The fruit size ranges from 0.5-1.0 lbs. and occurs without cross or hand pollination. Fruit is reddish pink outside and bright pink inside.

Hylocereus undatus 'Dark Star' -A medium to large sized fruit that typically weighs 0.75-1.25 pounds. This variety has long skinny bracts or fins that make it especially attractive. The fruit have a mild grape-like flavor that is most enjoyed when chilled and eaten fresh. This variety is self pollinating, and it will set fruit on its own. Fruit is reddish outside and pink inside.

Hylocereus polyrhizus X undatus 'Delight'- A seedling selection made by the California Rare Fruit Growers. It is a medium to large fruit typically weighing 0.75-1.0 lb. The pulp is sweet with a smooth texture and unique pink hue. It is self pollinating, and it will set fruit without hand pollination. Fruit is reddish outside and light pink inside.

Hylocereus undatus 'Golden Dragon" is delicious and exotic. Fruit is golden outside and white inside.

Hylocereus undatus X polyrhizus 'Halley’s Comet' -Another hybrid of a white fleshed and red fleshed fruit. It is incredibly large, typically weighing 1.5-2.0 lbs. The fruit is slightly more rounded than the Physical Graffiti, and the fins are more abbreviated. In all other respects they are nearly identical. Fruitis reddish outside and bright pink inside.

Hylocereus polyrhizus X. H. undatus 'Physical Graffiti'- Is a hybrid of a red fleshed and a white fleshed fruit. The result is a remarkably delicious variety that is both showy inside and out. The fruit is large, ranging in size from 0.75-1.5 lbs., and occurs without cross or hand pollination. This variety is certainly worthy of attention by commercial growers and home owners alike. Fruit is red outside and dark pink inside.

Hylocereus undatus 'Red Dragon' The Red Fleshed variety is rapidly gaining popularity. The fruit is red outside and red inside.

Hylocereus undatus 'Seoul Kitchen' -A medium to large fruit typically weighing 0.75-1.0 lbs. The pulp is smooth and sweet, and it is excellent when chilled and eaten out of hand. This variety is self pollinating, and it will set fruit without hand pollination. Fruit is pink outside and white inside.

Hylocereus undatus 'Thompson'- Another selection made by the California Rare Fruit Growers. It is a large robust fruit that can weigh up to 1.5 pounds. The pulp is sweet and flavorful, and it separates easily from its thick rind. This variety is self pollinating. Fruit is pink outside and white inside.

Source: http://stokestropicals.plants.com/Hylocereus-undatus-Dragon-Fruit-P237.aspx

So would a Hylocereus polyrhizus set fruit without cross or hand pollination or only the hybrids??

[Dreamwalker.]

night blooming....do you have suitable pollinators in your area?

[gr33ntea]

Moths, fruit bats, ants. I am curious if Hylocereus is a type I self-pollinator.

"In Type I self-pollination, pollen is transferred from the anther to the stigma of the same flower. Such flowers are hermaphrodites, which have both sexes."

[zelly]

no bearing on the discussion, but recently I had several flowers blooming at the same time, so i crossed the top flower with the bottom flower & now have a fruit on the bottom plant, a dragon fruit of some sort i suppose

the top flower is a T. spachianus

[gr33ntea]

no bearing on the discussion, but recently I had several flowers blooming at the same time, so i crossed the top flower with the bottom flower & now have a fruit on the bottom plant, a dragon fruit of some sort i suppose

the top flower is a T. spachianus

seleFLRDSC_0896r.jpg

Did you just create a hybrid :D?