I've tried EVERYTHING and the rain is just making it worse. Peroxide, alcohol, scraping with a knife, Immunox fungucide spray, a whole bunch of other things. None of the stores around me including nurseries have copper fungicide and the rare few that do never have any in stock. I went to home depot and their system said they had 12 in stock but there were none on the shelf and they just said sorry. It doesn't matter as they are preventative not curative, so they wouldn't do much anyway. Is there absolutely anything else I can do? I have a bottle of Roundup ready to go if I can't get this under control. More fungus means less fruit and less reason to keep the plant. I also have a couple of my rooted cuttings showing signs of rust, too. The chemical treatment I tried didn't work. If there's nothing else I'm just going to kill it. I've worked hard to keep this plant alive and I've gotten nothing in return.

I guess sometimes you have to choose your battles. I wonder why the solution to these things has to come in a bottle (even if it is the sacrifice of the plant). To be honest, I would see what you have observed and shrug and go about my day without worrying about it any more. I have kept one of these alive as a container plant on the patio for many years, and it puts out a pretty good flower display every year, delicious fruit every so often, but the stems are very imperfect. I don't dwell on that aspect.

Same here but with plants in general. I have plants that look way worse after every summer (and for some you can insert winter instead) and keep growing just fine... if I had to worry about every blemish or spot I'd have to stop this hobby or it would drive me nuts. If this really is of so much concern, I suspect you'd have to get yourself a climate controlled green house.

Well, some of them are developing literal holes in the branches. So it would be nice to be able to keep these things under control.

That looks like mechanical damage to me. Is there some animal with a beak or claws around? Not that it couldn't have been some kind of progressive damage due to microorganisms. I'm just trying to make sense of this from my own experience.

Speaking of which, something is happening here (photo from this afternoon).



Don't know what it is, don't really care, I'm going to take that plant out before the end of the winter. There's a problem with the pot and it can't really be solved without removal, given the way the plant has been growing into the wall.

I had something similar happen to mine, I suspect some kind of sun response despite it looking like it could be fungal.

In my case it started happening after I cut back a chunk of Bougainvillea and the cactus saw a lot more low angle sun...

I've always kept it in the sun. It doesn't make any kind of difference. It's like the plant just wants to die. Everything I put on it was washed off by the rain, so it isn't that.

The only option is roundup. Wasted my time keeping this thing alive.

What did you put on it, that was washed off by rain? I feel like we've missed part of the story here. And why are you still considering Roundup as an option? I still can't wrap my head around that. Isn't composting or binning the plant enough on its own?

Seems like this is a case of expectations not being met (fruit not being produced for consumption, presumably). I can relate to that. But I firmly believe that coming out of this without fruit in hand (or in mouth, as the case may be) does not mean the experience was wasted, and that you have gotten something in return for the effort, if you take the time to digest the experience and appreciate what steps led you to this outcome. For some people, gardening is about the result. For others it's about the process. I try to focus on the second path, because it leads to richer things down the road. There is always learning and honing to be done so that tomorrow's plants thrive in a way that today's may not.

I used copper fungicide. It had no effect before the rain and obviously only encouraged the fungal growth after.

Anyway none of the cuttings I've taken off this plant have rooted and I have yet to see a flower on my mature plant. I'm really leaning towards giving it roundup and ending it. I never thought dragonfruits could be so high maintenance but they are. I've already tossed a bunch that didn't root. I tried EVERYTHING to get then to grow but I'm not good enough to deserve successful rooting. They require greenhouses and VERY controlled conditions to spawn roots. These ones actually don't have fungus but they still would rather die than root. Anyone who says otherwise is lying. I've wasted a lot of time and money. I'm done with them.

Just confirming that it is, indeed, time for Roundup. If you get cactus rust, or any other kind of rust, pull the plant and any others surrounding it. Prevention is the key. Once infected there is nothing you can do.