Dragon Fruit Project - Starting June 2012

I am keen to grow all sort of fruit in our suburban backyard but as space is limited I am mindful of space requirement.  Then I came across article about dragon fruit, low maintenance, low water requirement (succulent family) and about 1x1 square meter should be fine.  You can buy this fruit in Saturday market, but they are expensive at about $5 each.  So why not try to grow it myself? 

I found a private Seller who lives in Riverhills, a few suburb away from where I live, and bought $20 worth of dragon fruit plant from him.  If the plant grows where he lives then there is a chance I will be able to grow it too in my backyard.

From what I read on the internet, you need to grow the plant vertical as naturally in the wild they'll climb a tree like orchid or vanilla. So in my mind this is not that hard to prepare, I was going to allocate a small corner of my raised garden bed then support the cactus like plant by a fencing trellis. Easy fix... Not!  Remember how they grow naturally in the wild, the seller told me the support needs to be of wood/timber material such as tree trunk or old timber so its root can stick to it.   Luckily my poor hubby agree to build a purposedly raised garden bed for this special plant, with plenty of back message in return of course!!

Material used: recycled old timber stairs and old hard wood post leftover from house reno. 
Height of garden bed about 30 cm.
Height of timber post about 2 mt.
Used twine (from haybales) to tie the plant to the timber post - in time, as I was told, the plant will send out new roots so the plant will stick to the post

Photo below taken 30/06/12

As at 18/08/12 from a few meters away nothing seem to have happened...

 But on a closer look, new shoot is coming up... See front of the photo, with reddish growth on the edge of the branch.

 And in many places...

 I was told it may take up to a year before the plant bear fruit so be patience my Dear!

I basically have followed all the tips and tricks I found, be it from the internet or from the Seller.  It seems working so far but only time will tell... Fingers crossed!

- Free draining soil (this is why I grow this plant on raised garden bed)
- No fertiliser required but spray it occassionaly with liquid seaweed (ie Seasol etc).
- Mulch around it (nice and cool so the worm will hang around)
- Don't water it too much or the root will rot (remember this plant is succulent/cactus)

01/09/12 Of all the new shoots I can see, this particular one look a bit different.  Could this be.... ????  So I look up the internet and from some photos I found this might be a flower bud.  Yeeeeyyyy.... I hope so!  It indeed turned out to be my first flower bud.