Osage Orange
Maclura pomifera
Planted by the millions as thorny “hedge apple” fencing before barbed wire, and still recognized by its grapefruit-sized, brain-textured green fruit. The wood is among the hardest and most rot-resistant in North America and was the premier bow wood of the Plains. Only female trees fruit, and thornless male cultivars exist for street use. The oversized fruit is thought to be an evolutionary orphan, once dispersed by extinct megafauna.
- Family
- Moraceae
- Type
- tree
- Lifespan
- perennial
- Height
- 35–60 ft
- Spacing
- 35–60 ft apart
- Light
- sun, part shade
- Soil moisture
- dry
- Soil pH
- acidic, neutral
- Bloom
- April, May, June
- Bloom colors
- green
- Wildlife value
- songbirds, mammals
- Landscape uses
- hedge or screen
- Native states
- AR, LA, OK, TX