The Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera) is a flowering deciduous tree in the Moraceae family. It is also known as the Hedge Apple, Horse Apple, Monkey Ball, and Bois d’Arc (Bow Wood).
Pomifera means ‘bearing apples’ – because the fruit looks like green apples. However, it is neither an orange, nor an apple.
It is found in America and eastern Europe.
It grows to about 8-15 metres (25-50 feet) tall, with hairy, spherical, yellow-green male and female flowers.
The fruit is round with bumpy (but not spikey) nodes, about 8-13 centimetres (3-5 inches) in diameter – the size of a tennis ball, grapefruit, or large green apple. In autumn it turns bright lime-green.
Photographed at the National Botanical Garden of Georgia, Tbilisi, October 2015.
Photographer: Martina Nicolls
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