As a line clearance arborist these trees are the bane of my existence, by far the strongest tree around and those thorns are like needles stabbing straight through my leather arborist work gloves and my pants, embedding deep into the skin, and breaking off, often leading to sores that last week's! My thighs look like I have a disease my arms look like I'm suicidal. But I always remember, God is good!

I can see why this is a popular segment at your church. Very interesting! Thanks for sharing it with us!

Not a Christian, but a plant-enthusiast. This man is adorable! Did a great job talking about the fruit. Considering watching all the Nature Lesson videos now

Osage orange wood is highly sought after by bow makers

Pastor may I add that I won my state archery championship with a bow made from Osage Orange. The most sought after wood for bow making. Strong and flexible and beautiful. God Bless.

the tablespoon I ate sure cleaned out my colon. Supposedly has anti cancer properties too. Doesn't taste good, but smells good.

Missouri is full of hedge apples and the trunks are used for fence end posts in field fence because they are so strong and rot resistant

Loved your nature lesson. My son is 40 now, but when he was a boy, there were so many of the Osage oranges in Memphis where we lived, that the neighborhood boys would play baseball with them.

Thank you, Horace! As a child, my brother and I would use these “Brain Balls” as bowling balls to strike down sticks that we had pushed into the dirt.

Wow, including a nature lesson with a sermon is a fantastic thing. I enjoyed this short lesson. These trees are not plentiful in where I live in SW Ontario, but interestingly I have often spotted them around cemetaries. We collect the fruits in fall to use as Christmas dressing in our window boxes along with red dogwood, hemlock, white pine boughs etc, I have wtched the squirrels get int the fruits in late winter and always thought they were craving viatimin C....but now I know why...Thanks!

"I am standing right in frontof that church right now" with a GRAVEYARD IN THE BACKGROUND. 🤣😂🤣😂 Swap places w the camera!!!

I live in Maryland and use Osage to make bows. I have a friend who owns a farm where it is growing wild and gave me permission to take as much Osage as I want. But if you cut down the trees, be careful. The sap will cause a rash on your skin and the thorns will pierce right through a leather work glove.

Good video ....many thanks.

You have added to my knowledge of this tree. I always thought it was poisonous. Thanks for the nature lesson.

$6 a piece?! They grew at the bus stop in Ohio growing up, we called them "Monkey Balls", we were told they were good at keeping spiders away if you bring them in the house. We coulda been rich! Haha, awesome video Pastor, thank you!

i am from Northeast Ohio. see these all the time. when i was a kid, boys used to throw these at us. 🤣🤣

We cut down and cleared out 2 of these trees from a guys property. Looking at the rings the trees were 150 yrs old. Wood was very very heavy. Eats up chainsaw blades. Orange inside. Lots of thorns. Wylie Texas

Hi Horace, I live in Covington, KY, right across from Cincinnati. A park by my house has 100's of these, lying on the ground. I see them on the Ohio side too. It's a shame that they're not edible. They might be diminishing, but they'll be around for a long time. There are just too many of them. Your talk was very informative.

Very informative and interesting! Thanks Sir!

Thank you Pastor for this lesson! I live in the corner of Kansas-Oklahoma-Missouri-Arkansas, Independence Kansas and I recently took up woodworking a my snior-citizen hobby (i am blessed to be 80+ and full of energy and ideas!) I tried last year to start on good old "Hedge Apple" wood and tried to work on fresh cut hedge...WOW!, not a good move, but now my collection has cured and aged outdoors for about 18 months and I am gonna try to make Christmas presents for friends and family out of this beautiful FREE wood. I was totally amazed to learn that "city folks" were paying a premium for what we consider firewood, "nuisance in the pastures and yards", abundant on the country roads (of which we have many) and basically worthless. I live in town, but my father-in-law has a small farm just north of me and he said I could help myself if I would handle the chainsaw. Lesson learned...hedge is tough stuff! All said I hope I can send you pictures of my finished Osage Orange attempts. Thank you again!

One interesting thing is that this tree only really grew in a certain basin in texas, but humans have spread it all across america. It just didn’t get spread by much else before we spread it. Very useful tree. Usually animals will spread trees by eating the seed etc, but when squirrells or deer eat it they destroy the seed so it won’t spread by them.

One theory: Botanists suggest that Osage oranges were likely favorite fruits of mammoths and mastodons along with ground sloths and American horses. These animals went extinct around the same time as the Eremotherium, likely as a result of intensive hunting by the first humans to settle in the Americas. Bois d’arc thorns would have kept these large mammals from stripping the leaves off the tree, but the fallen fruits would have provided a ready meal for hungry mammoths, who then spread the seeds far and wide.

Lovely video, Pastor Douty! I live in southern PA and we have quite a few here, fortunately. I grew up in Southern Delaware where we knew them as crab apples or horse apples. The Osage Orange is quite a valuable tree!

Knew about Osage tree's but never heard kin to mulberry, there fruit is sticky beautiful wood

I love Osage orange! Just a kid in wood shop class, but it makes some amazing pens.

I planted hedge apple to make a wind break for my garden, as there would seem to always be a summer storm from the southwest that would blow my sweet corn down. It works well.

Excellent information. It would’ve been interesting to see that 50’ tree. I have several here but not near that big. Thanks for sharing

Thank you for sharing. Have a blessed day.

But seriously thank you for the excellent video, we need to plant the osage bo dark!

I live in Lexington KY and saw one of these on the ground. Im originally from NY and was like, what the heck is that? Your explanation ws great!

In Texas they call this tree "bodark" which is a corruption of its true French tree name "bois d'arc" (wood for archer or something close) which was used for archery bows and because of its toughness - children's hammers and saws. It made a very nice rudimentary handsaw which would actually cut soft woods. Great for woodturnng too. We have many of them in north Alabama where I live.

lovely video horace!!

Thanks for the lesson. Great info

That was a good lesson. Thanks! I spotted one while hunting yesterday and thought, "What in the world is this tree?". lol

Gorgeous churchyard. Lots of old Presby churches from there south to Orange County NC.

Not a Christian but a plant enthusiast as well. Thank you for this video - I'd sit and listen to a sermon of yours :)

Very informative and interesting for sure, thanks for sharing and god bless you

😃 thank you!

You forgot to mention that it's the best bow wood in the world, followed by yew.

Nice video. Our Creator is so generous 😍 particularly with trees.

My property (Northern Missouri) has many of the Osage Orange trees in the woodlands. Everything said here I have observed on my property. We have gathered some of the hedge apples so that we might cultivate the trees to produce natural boundaries between crop, garden, and forest. The wood is bright yellow, very heavy and dense, and burns ferociously when correctly seasoned. It also withstands rotting even when in ground contact similar to Honey Locust. A wonderful wood for many uses.

Ironwood is about the only wood I’m aware of that’s as hard and dense. Great lesson Pastor, God bless you and yours.

Awesome

In Mississippi our horses love them and U R right about the wood . We always called the fruit hedge apples 👍🤠

Lovely thank you

Also highly prized as a wood to make traditional bows.

Late to the party, I know, BUT.... As we know, every plant has a seed dispersal method through s symbiotic relationship with an animal, for example, Mulberry trees use birds to eat the berries and disperse the seeds in their waste. The Osage Orange, however, developed a symbiotic relationship with animals long gone from our lands: the Mastodons and Wooly Mammoths! They treasured the fruits, being "mast" eaters (the fibrous stuff inside the fruits), and dispersed mounds of seed filled poo wherever they went. The trees were found all over the continent where glaciers were not covering the ground. Once the great Pachyderms died out, the trees no longer had a reliable dispersal method besides the occasional fruits floating down rivers and streams, which is why, besides the farmers planting "hedge rows", the main place you find the now elephant free trees growing is in creek and river bottoms. 😉

Very good also great for bow making thank you

Thank you

Bless you:)

Osage also grows very fast, 3-6ft per year. Beautiful wood grain. We have several in MD eastern shore.

Hola, Sr.Pastor..,soy de La Pampa..el nombre..común...aqui..es Maclura...su.nombre cientifico..lo debe conocer Maclura Pomerata..por su olor citrico..me farique un cabo de Hacha..es sensacional...voy.a enseñar a los mas jóvenes..,para que siga existiendo.por aca, y Dios quiera que jamás..se extinga..soy de La Pampa,Republica Argentina..😊😊😊

Thanks for the info. Very interesting. Just bought some seeds to plant this tree. Hoping that it keeps the raccons away.

In Kentucky we call them hedge apple.

As a kid we was told that it was poisonous. But I know it was edible, but not what part. Thank you for the info.

Why was this video recommended to me? lol Nice video though. I knew most of these, but I did not about people using them as a barrier to deter animals. Very cool.

😲 I was gonna cut the one in yard. The fruit almost fell on my head, so much revenge was eminent. But I'm glad I haven't acted on my emotions.

For some reason here in Ohio we called them monkey balls lol.

I heard somewhere that the Indians used the wood to male their arrows from.

A lot of work to get the seeds. Which are supposedly the only edible part.

When is this time of year?? U can buy anything on-line!!

Neat 🙂

Up in Indiana we called damn Martian turds

I was told that the fruit will repell spyders in your basement and garage!

Why is the tree thorny to protect a fruit that most animals won't eat?

It’s odd that you. didn’t mention its name used here.East Texas. Bois d arc ,that is,French for “wood for bows”

Dig a trench drop in the fruit every three feet and in about a decade you will have a fence that will outlast you with no maintenance required ever.👍

*The proper name is Bodark.*

The kids would go out and throw the "brains" into the woods so I would not run over them with my mower. Only the female tree had the brain like fruit.

I would highly suggest speaking to your “church” about sin and the gospel of Jesus and leave the nature talks for some other time.