Do Bois D Arc Trees Have Horse Apples?

Horse Apples aka Osage Orange aka Bois D’ark fruit aren’t edible in the traditional sense of fruit. Their flesh is sticky, mealy, and generally unpleasant. However, their roasted seeds, though messy to free from the pulp, are plentiful and tasty, having a flavor somewhat like sunflower seeds.

Is Bois d arc the same as Osage orange?

Bois d’arc, also commonly named osage orange, is a small to medium-sized tree in the mulberry family growing to 60 feet tall. It is a perennial, cool-season native with white, milky sap. The deciduous leaves are simple, range from 2 to 4 inches long, and are located alternately along the stem.

How do you identify a Bois D Arc tree?

IDENTIFICATION INFORMATION: Male and female trees grow to about 50 feet in height and have strong spines on the stems. Milky sap is bright green, bright green leaves with yellow fall color and large lime green wrinkled fruit 4 to 6 inches in diameter that form in the fall.

Is Bois D Arc toxic?

Although Osage-orange fruit and branches ooze a latex-like sap when cut, several studies have shown that the fruit is not poisonous to livestock, wildlife, or humans.

Can you eat horse apples?

Horse apples are generally considered inedible by humans (and most animals, including horses). The size of the fruit has caused livestock fatalities from choking.

Can you eat bois D Arc apples?

Horse Apples aka Osage Orange aka Bois D’ark fruit aren’t edible in the traditional sense of fruit. Their flesh is sticky, mealy, and generally unpleasant. However, their roasted seeds, though messy to free from the pulp, are plentiful and tasty, having a flavor somewhat like sunflower seeds.

What trees have horse apples?

Osage orange trees are not related to oranges; they’re more closely related to mulberries. Even more confusingly, the most common name for their fruit is hedge apple (though they’re also called horse apples, Irish snowballs, or monkey brains).

Are hedge apples poisonous to horses?

Studies have shown that hedge apples are innocuous to horses when ingested. Horses generally bypass the fruit when browsing because of its extremely hard texture and unpalatability, especially when there is other forage to satiate hunger.

Are horse apples good for anything?

The hedge apples, also called hedge balls, Osage oranges, horse apples and even monkey balls, are promoted as a spider and roach repellent.

Do all bois D Arc trees produce fruit?

Growing in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 5a through 9a, it reaches 30 to 40 feet tall and 20 to 40 feet wide. Round, green fruits are 3 to 6 inches wide and have rough, wrinkled skin that ripens to yellowish-green. Trees are either male or female, and only the females produce fruit.

What animal eats Osage orange?

Even animals detest the taste of Osage oranges. The only animals known to eat them are deer and squirrels, and even they only eat the seeds inside the orange.

How long do bodark trees live?

The yellow-orange color of the wood makes it attractive for many different uses. Osage orange typically lives about 75 years with a moderate growth rate of about 1 foot per year.

What is Bois D Arc wood used for?

The common name, “bois d’arc” is French for “bow-wood,” a reference to the use by Native Americans for bows and war clubs. This species was also widely distributed and planted to make hedgerows and livestock pens prior to the invention of barbed wire.

What is another name for horse apples?

One of the few trees of the original forest on UT’s main campus is a huge Maclura pomifera, also known as “Osage orange” or “horse apple.” A male tree of this species grows in front of Welch Hall.

Are horse apples poisonous to squirrels?

Hedge apple fruit
It’s full of sticky, acrid white latex or milk (be careful, it just might irritate the skin) along with hundreds of seeds, and it emits an “orange” scent from which the tree derived its name. Squirrels and chipmunks love hedge apples; humans do not, but they’re not poisonous. Cattle can choke on them.

Do deer eat horse apples?

Several came through and some stop to sniff the fruit on the ground or up in the tree, but none were seen to feed. The occasional young buck would pass through, and they often seemed slightly more interested in the horse apples than the does and fawns, but I did not record them eating the fruit either.

Do hedge apples repel mice?

One of the more creative uses for hedge apples we will discuss below: using them to repel pests such as spiders and mice. The oils in hedge apples are well known for repelling pests such as spiders and mice. And the good news is, using hedge apples to repel these pests couldn’t be easier!

Do horse apples repel roaches?

I have received several reports that bois d’arc fruit (horse apples) do in fact repel roaches and other pests. Most people use the entire fruit without cutting in half. It’s interesting that squirrels certainly aren’t repelled by them. They apparently love the taste.

Is Osage orange poisonous to humans?

Although both the fruit and branches ooze a latex-like sap when cut, several studies have shown that the fruit is not poisonous to livestock, wildlife, or humans. Osage-orange can now be found in all 48 contiguous states.

What are the smooth green balls that fall from trees?

In our neck of the woods, they are commonly called “monkey balls,” but in other regions, this peculiar fruit and the trees from which they fall are known as hedge apples. The tree’s official name is Osage orange.

Is Bois D Arc good firewood?

Science Says The Best Wood To Burn Is …
Osage Orage (AKA Hedge/Hedge Apple Tree/Bodark/Bois d’arc) – 30.0 mBTU/cord with a recommended 12 month drying time. Gamble Oak is 28.0 mBTU/cord with a recommended drying time of 36 months.