Dragon Fruit - Hand Pollination

[sc4001992]

I have a question on hand pollination of DF flowers. The DF thread is to long to read through every post so I will ask my question here.

I have a yellow dragon fruit that has 5 flowers on it. One flower already bloomed and I think I hand pollinated it ok. My question is before the next 4 flowers open, how do you know if the hand pollinated flower is good and will be making a fruit?

I hand pollinated the flower last week, and it appears that the stem of the flower area is starting to swell so I'm assuming there will be a fruit. I will post a few photos of the first flower.

If anyone can tell me how long after you hand pollinate that you will see the results and how long does it take before the fruit grow and ripens that would help out.

Thanks.

[K-Rimes]

I can tell usually in 1 week. If the base of bud is firm, green, and doesn’t wiggle you can be pretty sure. It’s a no go once it goes yellow.

[FV Fruit Freak]

You don’t really need to hand pollinate yellow dragon fruit, at least not the variety I have (giant magalanthus), the stigma is so close to the pollen it pollinates itself. I didn’t hand pollinate this year and got 5/5 fruit set. Which variety of yellow are you growing Kaz?

[sc4001992]

Here's some photos of the one flower before (10-30-21) and after (11-6-21) hand pollination. Can you tell if the flower will become a fruit ?

Nate, the tag says "Yellow DF", purchased from Home Depot.

[sc4001992]

Here's the photos of the other remaining flowers that should open up soon.

Anyone know if the flowers only open up at night ? I had to pollinate the first flower after dark with a headlight.

Thanks.

[spaugh]

Kaz, those are self fertile flowers, bees will get you high fruitset rate.  Yours looks like a columbian plant which makes tiny fruit.  I have some better yellow plants that make 1 pound fruit if you rather grow the improved version of that.  Ill give you a few different ones if you are interested in growing that kind of plant.

[sc4001992]

Brad, ok thanks that would be great. I do like the taste of the yellow dragon fruit, seems to be sweeter than the other colors.
I also have a red flesh DF someone gave me and it grows a lot but not much flowers on it so I have never had a red fruit for 4 yrs on the large plant.

[Jose Spain]

If anyone can tell me how long after you hand pollinate that you will see the results and how long does it take before the fruit grow and ripens that would help out.

Thanks.

With megalanthus (specially Colombian cv) might take a bit longer than with other DF as a result of its natural slow pace and also because as it blossoms at this part of the year, temperatures make any pitaya slow down. Usually about 1 week-10 days after pollination, a thin line appears in the point where the tube of the flower will eventually die and separate from the fruit, from this line backwards the color is green and towards the flower is first pink-yellow (in your first fruit it's about to appear). I have pollinized megalanthus as late as 2PM, the next day to the flower opening, but doing it the early morning would be better and doing it at the early night the same day it opens would be even better. But as Brad explained, this species doesn't really need hand pollination unless that you want to make some cross or get your fruit as big as possible.

[Jose Spain]

As for ripening, California has a similar climate to Andalusia but I'm not sure to what extent they are really equivalent, here the Colombian megalanthus start to change color in April, and they are harvested through May until the end of June easily, as least in my location.

[sc4001992]

Jose, thanks for your comments on what to look for after hand pollinating it.