What is the difference between the night-blooming cereus flower and the dragon fruit flower?
The night-blooming cereus and the dragon fruit flower not only look alike and are hard to tell apart, but they really do have a “family relationship”; according to the Flora of China, they both belong to the cactus family. So what is the difference between the night-blooming cereus and the dragon fruit flower?
Dragon fruit is a climbing succulent shrub of the genus Hylocereus in the cactus family, with the scientific name “Hylocereus undatus”. The night-blooming cereus is an epiphytic succulent shrub of the genus Epiphyllum in the cactus family.
It is impossible to distinguish the night-blooming cereus from the dragon fruit flower with the naked eye alone. If you looked only at the flowers, even Sun Wukong's fiery golden eyes probably could not tell the difference between the night-blooming cereus and the dragon fruit flower, but we can look at the branches! Hylocereus undatus has “many branches, extended, with three angles or ridges”, while the night-blooming cereus has “many branches, flattened laterally like leaves”.
There is a very obvious difference between dragon fruit and the night-blooming cereus. The entire dragon fruit plant has succulent stems and leaves, it flowers and fruits on the stems and leaves, and it bears thorns; the white flower it produces has a layer of green skin on the outside; the leaves of the entire night-blooming cereus plant are relatively slender, and the flower it produces has a layer of red skin on the outside, carries a certain fragrance, cannot bear fruit, and the plant has no thorns.
The stems of dragon fruit have thorns, and the flowers generally open at 9 p.m. and only wither the next morning; its flowers are also very large, with a layer of green skin on the outside; the night-blooming cereus has no thorns on its body, and its flowers generally bloom at night and wither after 3 hours; its flowers are very white, carry a certain fragrance, and have a layer of red skin on the outside.