Dragon Fruit ( Hylocereus undatus) is a lovely tropical fruit. We have been enjoying it throughout the summer in Florida at the ECHO North America Impact Center. In addition to being beautiful and delicious it is fairly easy to propagate by cuttings.
Often they will start to send out roots on their own, while still attached to the main plant at the woodier stem sections, as seen in the photo below. If this happens you can simply take the cuttings at the stem below the roots, let the cutting harden off for a few days and plant. It is important to not bury the green stem in the soil or else it will be prone to rot.
If you need more plants but only have a few sections of stem you can take cuttings mid fleshy stem. A network member in Senegal taught us how he successfully rooted Dragon Fruit at scale. To maximize his cutting material, he takes cuttings mid stem and then trims them down to the center stem core at the base of the cutting, as seen in the photo below. This was then allowed to sit out and harden off for a few days before planting.
He shared that no matter which style of cutting you do “only minimal soil depth is needed, and any buried fleshy areas will tend to rot.”
If you want to learn more about Dragon Fruit in the Florida home garden context IFAS has a helpful publication on it at HS1068/HS303: Pitaya (Dragonfruit) Growing in the Florida Home Landscape.
How have you rooted Dragon Fruit in your context? Do you have a favorite variety? Does anyone know of a good yellow Dragon Fruit variety that withstands high humidity well?