Simon is a South Western Australian Dragon fruit farmer who has gone from back yard enthusiast to starting his own farm- Simion's Dragon Fruit.
Simon is also producing his own varieties by controlled x pollination of dragon fruit.
Keep a look out for his Connie Mayer X Purple Haze.- Olivia's Pink dragon fruit.
He has also crossed Black x Purple Haze dragon fruit
What suburb and state are you located?
I’m located in Gosnells W.A with my farm in Champion Lakes.
Growing dragon fruit in the Perth region plants seem to pretty much grow all year around though obviously slower over winter.
Fruiting of dragon fruit in the Perth Region can occur through out December to May, though It depends on the variety with Palora on the vine over winter.
What are the temperatures like where you live and do you get frost?
We mostly get down to 4 or 5 in winter, rarely have frosts though, we had our first here with a -0.1 where we had our bundy red branches frozen and left a sloppy mess.
We get over 40 maybe 4/5 times in the hottest part of the year Jan/ February, but it’s mainly mid to late 30’s most of the time.
Obviously WA is a huge state with different climates, a bit like if Queensland, NSW and Victoria were one state.
Very hot, with distinct wet and dry seasons and humidity up north.
Colder inland and weather like Melbourne down south, probably not quite as cold as here or inland, but several seasons in one day.
How long have you been an avid gardener for?
I’ve been keen on gardening since I was a little boy in overalls when I grew vegetables in mums back yard.
What is your history with gardening and horticulture?
I grew vegetables for fun, then moved onto Horticulture qualifications, a few jobs in nursery’s and now I work for local government in parks, landscape my own gardens and grow dragon fruit.
Can you please walk me through your history with dragon fruit and what was your 1st dragon fruit experience eating?
I visited Townsville in 2015 and visited a market on the strand I believe and tried these weird things which look like dragons eggs and bought two back to the caravan and tried them. When I came home I bought a stock standard pink skinned white flesh from Bunnings, followed by a noid red and what I now know to be a Selenicerius Megalanthius. I’ve been hooked ever since and now have over 100 varieties and have needed to buy 3/4 an acre in Champion Lakes on which I also grow mangos, a cherry, a blood orange, rio red grapefruit, custard apples and Star fruit. I’ve appeared on curtain radio, talkback radio several times and my farms been recently on Garden Gurus.
In this episode (Episode 13) of Gardening Gurus Neville Passmore walks through Simons Dragon fruit farm looking at how to grow dragon fruit.
What was your 1st dragon fruit experience growing?
My first Dragon Fruit was only a white fleshed hylocereus undatus as not much more was available at the time. 
What is your Favorite variety and why?
My favourite variety would be either Purple Megalanthus or Purple Haze, so many it’s hard to choose. Purple Megalanthus possibly because it’s both sweet and tasty.
What is your favorite dragon fruit recipe?
My wife’s delicious dragon fruit cheesecake, I just grow the fruits
Best tip for growing dragon fruit.
Try and grow one variety up a post of you plan to share your plants as mixing them up leads to confusion.
Biggest no, no for growing dragon fruit
Never ever rename a variety you’ve lost the name of, or for your own selfish means. Renaming or altering names even slightly confuses newbies and can deceive people into buying another of a variety they already have.
Biggest challenge for growing dragon fruit you have had?
My biggest challenge I’m in the middle of and that’s trying to transition from a backyard set up to a farm as I’ve had to find the land, then clean it up as it was badly neglected and then set it up for growing. I’m still probably a year away from getting it completely sorted.
What varieties are you growing?
It’s hard to say what varieties I have a I have so many, but of anyone’s interested, Simon’s dragon fruit is on Facebook is the place to go.
Simon has lots of growing tips and you can follow his journey on his new farm. Due to Biosecurity we can not send dragon fruit cuttings to Western Australia and Simon can not send cutting out side Western Australia. So if you are interested in growing Dragon fruit in Western Australia get a hold of Simon for advice and local Western Australian dragon fruit cuttings.
A big thank you to Simon and his wife for sharing taking the time to share this information with us.
