From hand pollinating flowers at night to avoiding cactus pricks, growing this unique fruit is a labour of love for Gary and Sue Lee.
abc.net.au/news/central-queensland-farm-couple-growing-dragon-fruit-plantation/101890330What started as a humble hobby for Sue and Gary Lee, has turned into a 3,000-plant dragon fruit farm supplying fresh produce from central Queensland to Melbourne.
Griffith University nutrition and dietetics lecturer Lisa Vincze said early research showed the fruit had unique health benefits.Mr Lee works in an underground coal mine on alternative weeks while Ms Lee runs a childcare business four days a week."We still want to put in another 400 [plants] and we're up to about 92 varieties of different dragon fruit," Mr Lee said."We're not scared of a bit of hard work," she said.
"I normally vacuum of a night and collect pollen and then in the morning we go out hand pollinating with an old make up brush and a container of pollen," he said. "What the research shows [is for] people who have pre-diabetes, or people who have diabetes, it may actually help them to control their blood sugar levels," she said."We are seeing in the research that some of the antioxidants in [dragon fruit] may help to protect against some cell damage but the research in this area is fairly new."Dr Vincze said the fruit's seeds also contained healthy fatty acids.
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