I don't know why the Osage Orange is sometimes referred to has a hedge apple. It is true this hedge plant being a thorny tree has oft been used as a fence to keep the horses from jumping over it, the pigs from find their way under it, or the bulls from crashing through it. But if you look at the fruit it looks a great deal more like a mutant orange than any kind of apple.

When you first see the fruit you may wonder if it is edible. It is not. I looks like a bumpy grapefruit. What is true is that the trees were used as a kind of prairie fence before the advent of barbed wire.

Some say that there is something that can choke a horse-an Osage Orange. You will sometimes hear that farm animals get the fruit caught in their throats. Nevertheless, squirrels will sometimes rip away the flesh of the fruit to get at the seeds.

Hedge Apples produce entire trees which are male or female. Only the females produce fruit.

The wood is prized as bow wood by the archery crowd. It also make good fence posts that resist rot and it burns well in the fireplace too.

The Osage Orange has been shown to have some insect repellent properties. It contains a chemical which has a similar effect as the mosquito repellent Deet. In the past, some people have set out the fruit in their houses in an attempt to dissuade bugs from entering.

Wood from the tree was called Bodark because the French noticed that the Osage Indians used it to make bows of bows and arrows fame. So bois d'arc became bodarc or bodark. English speaking people often referred to trees as bow wood.

Like many of the world's most curious objects, the Osage Orange goes by many names. The scientists dubbed it Maclura pomifera. Other names are Osage-apple, mock orange, hedge-apple, horse-apple, and hedge ball. Some slang terms for the fruit are monkey ball, monkey orange and brain fruit.

Back in the wild west Hedge Apple trees were planted close together to form a living fence. Hedges formed from these trees were said to be "horse high, bull-strong, and hog-tight." The trees also served as wind breaks and shelterbelts and they slowed soil erosion.

The trees can grow to be 30 feet tall. They are in the same family as the mulberry (Moraceae).

Another name for the tree is yellow-wood. Some of its wood can be made to produce a yellow or orange dye.



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