I was long ago told these are called Horse Apples. They grow in a tree, like an apple. And then fall to the ground.
I saw this collection of ground bound Horse Apples today whilst walking in the Village Creek Historical Natural Area in Arlington.
If someone could properly identify the Horse Apples I would be appreciative of having my ignorance about this subject alleviated.
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Horse Apples are the fruit of the Osage Orange tree, AKA the B'oise de' Arc (Archer wood, pronounced "Bo-dark"), so named because plains Indians used the very dense, hard,heartwood to make bows(some of which pulled at close to 200 lb...)
Thanks, Alienengineer for explaining Horse Apples to me.
These trees were commonly planted across the plains as hedges in days prior to barbed wire as they can grow very densely together. Only the female trees produce the osage orange fruit, which are also commonly called hedge apples.
I also understand that they may be helpful in repelling cockroaches and spiders.
Thanks CP. I'm gonna pick up a bunch of Horse Apples next time I'm at Village Creek and feed them to my cockroaches.
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