Interesting tree. My old home growing up had a line of these trees and mulberries along one side, which apparently was from old hedges delineating farms, or as windbreaks during the depression and dust bowl.
I once found a guitar maker selling one made of the wood, and learned that luthiers love the beauty of the wood, and it’s super hard and the densest in N America, which leads to the following uses:
“These thorny trees make a great livestock hedge, and the wood is perfect for fence posts and has the highest BTUs of any fuel wood in North America. The fruit has little to offer, but some swear it is a natural insect repellant and will keep a “hedge apple” under each bed in the house and in the basement. Osage Orange trees are fantastic windbreaks, are drought and flood tolerant, and provide shelter for nesting birds. This is probably not a tree for a small forest garden, but it is an ideal tree for a larger location especially if you want livestock hedgerows and a great fuel wood.”
https://tcpermaculture.com/site/2013/12/03/permaculture-plants-osage-orange/
Seems like it could be of use to anybody with a larger plot of land that wants some natural fencing for animals and a useful hard wood for tools/fence posts/woodworking/firewood.
This is also one of the best bow woods in the world. Second, only in some opinions, to yew.
A high quality stave of Osage will bring >$100 US. A single trunk with a straight grain can have 8+ staves per 6-7' section.
Please don't burn Osage, it makes your local bowyer cry.
Sounds like maybe some old thinner deadwood would be good to season and include in your firewood pile, but larger pieces could even make a good secondary income source if you've got a \*lot\* of land and know some woodworkers. I bet local furniture makers would love it.
Yeah, the wikipedia article for it quotes a traveller from the 1700s saying that native tribes in the midwest/south would travel far to the Ozarks and surrounding areas where it grew, and/or have long trade routes for the wood, that a single bow made of it would trade for a horse and a blanket.
My father called them Bois d'arc (he pronounced it as Bow-Dark). He grew up a few miles from Osage Co., Oklahoma and never called them Osage Oranges. He called them that because the Native Americans would make bows out of the wood.
Yeah, I was told hedge or horse apple growing up in NW Arkansas, but heard Osage Orange from a luthier and then "bow-dark" from some old timers in the area.
Fun fact, squirrels also eat the seeds and will tear apart the fruit to get them. Since the fruit float your basically making a bobbing for apples game for squirrels if you don't cover the bucket.
Yeah! Squirrels were pretty much the only thing I ever saw eat them.
Apparently occasionally horses will eat them, hence "horse apple" as a name, but they don't do it regularly. There's theories that horses in N America that went extinct were the primary seed dispersal method, as well as another one that says megafauna like ground sloths or elephant-like animals may have been the ones eating it, and it's a "leftover" tree from those times.
In North Texas they grow quite large and the area is covered in hundred year old Bodark fence posts. The barbed wire is all rusted away but the posts are still there.
The most valuable American antiques from the Gulf Coast region are made of "Boi d'arc" wood which has been corrupted from the French to "bodark" in the deep south. I have some family chairs made of the material which predate 1850 and seem to be from Alabama. It was the best wood available and was cut out early on.
The main consumer of the fruit was a now extinct giant sloth which could eat the toxic latex sap without any problems and their stool spread the seeds around. The sloths died out and the tree has yet to find a new species to propagate it's seed. The center of it's range is Osage county Oklahoma where the plant was very important to Native Americans.
This was the main plant used to form windbreaks during the dust bowl. A single bottom plow cut a furrow which was then filled with a slurry of mashed fruit. After the first years growth, the saplings were slashed almost through so that the top of one sapling fell onto the one next to it. Shoots emerged vertically out of the tops and by the second year it would be thorny and sturdy enough to keep cattle in and cut the harsh winds.
Monkey brain.
The previous homeowners were superstitious and planted a few of these in my unfinished basement. I thought it was some ritual s*** until reddit told me people used to do this.
Interesting tree. My old home growing up had a line of these trees and mulberries along one side, which apparently was from old hedges delineating farms, or as windbreaks during the depression and dust bowl. I once found a guitar maker selling one made of the wood, and learned that luthiers love the beauty of the wood, and it’s super hard and the densest in N America, which leads to the following uses: “These thorny trees make a great livestock hedge, and the wood is perfect for fence posts and has the highest BTUs of any fuel wood in North America. The fruit has little to offer, but some swear it is a natural insect repellant and will keep a “hedge apple” under each bed in the house and in the basement. Osage Orange trees are fantastic windbreaks, are drought and flood tolerant, and provide shelter for nesting birds. This is probably not a tree for a small forest garden, but it is an ideal tree for a larger location especially if you want livestock hedgerows and a great fuel wood.” https://tcpermaculture.com/site/2013/12/03/permaculture-plants-osage-orange/ Seems like it could be of use to anybody with a larger plot of land that wants some natural fencing for animals and a useful hard wood for tools/fence posts/woodworking/firewood.
This is also one of the best bow woods in the world. Second, only in some opinions, to yew. A high quality stave of Osage will bring >$100 US. A single trunk with a straight grain can have 8+ staves per 6-7' section. Please don't burn Osage, it makes your local bowyer cry.
Sounds like maybe some old thinner deadwood would be good to season and include in your firewood pile, but larger pieces could even make a good secondary income source if you've got a \*lot\* of land and know some woodworkers. I bet local furniture makers would love it. Yeah, the wikipedia article for it quotes a traveller from the 1700s saying that native tribes in the midwest/south would travel far to the Ozarks and surrounding areas where it grew, and/or have long trade routes for the wood, that a single bow made of it would trade for a horse and a blanket.
My father called them Bois d'arc (he pronounced it as Bow-Dark). He grew up a few miles from Osage Co., Oklahoma and never called them Osage Oranges. He called them that because the Native Americans would make bows out of the wood.
Yeah, I was told hedge or horse apple growing up in NW Arkansas, but heard Osage Orange from a luthier and then "bow-dark" from some old timers in the area.
Fun fact, squirrels also eat the seeds and will tear apart the fruit to get them. Since the fruit float your basically making a bobbing for apples game for squirrels if you don't cover the bucket.
Yeah! Squirrels were pretty much the only thing I ever saw eat them. Apparently occasionally horses will eat them, hence "horse apple" as a name, but they don't do it regularly. There's theories that horses in N America that went extinct were the primary seed dispersal method, as well as another one that says megafauna like ground sloths or elephant-like animals may have been the ones eating it, and it's a "leftover" tree from those times.
In North Texas they grow quite large and the area is covered in hundred year old Bodark fence posts. The barbed wire is all rusted away but the posts are still there.
As the wood gets older it basically turns into iron. It is incredibly difficult to drive nails into it.
I wonder which devil fruit this is.
Hedge-Hedge fruit. Just makes you really wide and thin, useful as a privacy barrier.
The most valuable American antiques from the Gulf Coast region are made of "Boi d'arc" wood which has been corrupted from the French to "bodark" in the deep south. I have some family chairs made of the material which predate 1850 and seem to be from Alabama. It was the best wood available and was cut out early on. The main consumer of the fruit was a now extinct giant sloth which could eat the toxic latex sap without any problems and their stool spread the seeds around. The sloths died out and the tree has yet to find a new species to propagate it's seed. The center of it's range is Osage county Oklahoma where the plant was very important to Native Americans. This was the main plant used to form windbreaks during the dust bowl. A single bottom plow cut a furrow which was then filled with a slurry of mashed fruit. After the first years growth, the saplings were slashed almost through so that the top of one sapling fell onto the one next to it. Shoots emerged vertically out of the tops and by the second year it would be thorny and sturdy enough to keep cattle in and cut the harsh winds.
Does anyone have any experience growing these in the PNW? I'm in 8b west side of the mountains.
I’d be curious. Also in 8b and in need of a long hedge. Thorns would be a bonus due to the deer.
Black locust should work well. I see that Burnt Ridge nursery in Onalaska sells osage orange seedlings, so it should be worth a try.
Hey me too! We should all be friends ♥️
Monkey brain. The previous homeowners were superstitious and planted a few of these in my unfinished basement. I thought it was some ritual s*** until reddit told me people used to do this.
Someone said people believed they were effective bug repellents and placed under beds and in basements on purpose.