Horse apples are the fruit of the Osage orange, a tree in the mulberry family native to the south-central United States.1Wikipedia. Maclura pomifera Despite the nicknames, the fruit is neither an apple nor an orange.2Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation. What Are Horse Apples and Are The Edible? They aren’t poisonous, but almost everything except the seeds tastes bitter and is best left alone.3Eat The Weeds and other things, too. Osage Orange – Eat The Weeds and other things, too Few of today’s animals eat the fruit, and it may have evolved for giant mammals that died out thousands of years ago.4PubMed. Phylogeny and biogeography of Maclura (Moraceae) and the origin of an anachronistic fruit
How to Recognize a Horse Apple and Its Tree
The fruit is roughly round, covered in bumps like a brain, and about 3 to 6 inches across.5Wikipedia. Maclura pomifera It turns bright yellow-green and drops from the tree in mid to late fall.6Wikipedia. Maclura pomifera7Kentucky Equine Research. Hedge Apples and Horses It has a faint musky, citrus-like smell.8Substack. Foraging for Osage oranges If you cut or break the skin, a sticky white sap oozes out.9Substack. Foraging for Osage oranges Inside, the flesh is firm, creamy white to pale green, and holds 200 to 300 long, light brown seeds.10FOX 2 St. Louis. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible? Each fruit is really many tiny one-seeded fruits fused together into one ball.11Yard and Garden. All About Hedge Apples
The tree usually grows 30 to 50 feet tall, though it is sometimes more like a large shrub, and it loses its leaves in winter.12Wikipedia. Maclura pomifera Young trees often carry spines about an inch long.13Osage Orange (Bois d. Osage Orange (Bois d’ arc, Hedge Apple, Horse Apple) The Osage orange tree was once found only in a small area of Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.14Illinois Extension. Osage Orange It has since spread throughout the eastern states, mostly because settlers planted it as living fences.15Osage Orange (Bois d. Osage Orange (Bois d’ arc, Hedge Apple, Horse Apple)16Illinois Extension. Osage Orange
The tangle of names comes from its history. “Hedge apple” refers to its long use as a planted hedge on farms. “Horse apple” reflects the idea that horses would eat it. “Bois d’arc,” French for bow-wood, points to how prized its wood was for hunting bows. “Mock orange” and “Osage orange” nod to a faint resemblance to an unripe orange.
Look-alikes are easy to rule out. Real oranges and grapefruit have a smooth peel, while a horse apple is bumpy with no rind. Black walnuts in their green husks are smaller and smooth, and they stain hands brown. Neither of those releases white milky sap when cut, as a horse apple does.
Are Horse Apples Edible or Poisonous
Horse apples aren’t considered poisonous, and the flesh can technically be eaten.17FOX 2 St. Louis. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible? But it is bitter, and most people find it unpleasant to eat.18FOX 2 St. Louis. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible?19Specialty Produce. Osage Oranges Some people have had indigestion and felt ill after eating the fruit.20Specialty Produce. Osage Oranges So the usual advice is to skip the flesh and keep only the seeds.21Specialty Produce. Osage Oranges22Eat The Weeds and other things, too. Osage Orange – Eat The Weeds and other things, too Some sources also call the milky sap mildly toxic, mainly because it irritates the skin.23Neinvasives. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible?
The taste is so unpleasant that most people spit it out long before they swallow enough to get sick. The fruit is not a known poison but has no record as a safe food either, so avoid eating a large helping of the flesh.
If a child or adult takes a bite, a small one is unlikely to cause harm, and the taste usually stops people quickly. Rinse the mouth, and wash the hands and face if sap got on the skin. Watch for an upset stomach, and call poison control if symptoms are more than mild. Babies and toddlers could choke on chunks or seeds, so keep fallen fruit out of their reach.
How to Eat the Seeds Safely
The seeds are the most edible part of the fruit, and they are usually roasted and eaten as a snack.24FOX 2 St. Louis. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible?25Specialty Produce. Osage Oranges They sit inside tough, pithy fiber, so getting them out takes some work.26Substack. Foraging for Osage oranges The sap clings to them and irritates the skin, so wear gloves while you work.
Start with fruit that has sat outside for a while and gone soft. Fresh, firm fruit is dense and rubbery, so the seeds are locked in tightly and you end up mangling both fruit and seeds. A few weeks of weathering loosens the flesh so it breaks apart more easily. Choose fruit that is soft but not slimy or moldy, because rotten fruit makes the job messier and the seeds less appealing.
Work outdoors or over newspaper, since the sap is sticky. Break the fruit apart and pick the seeds out of the fiber. They are long and slender and scattered through the interior, so you will be picking them out one at a time. Then soak and rinse them in a bowl or colander, rubbing them between gloved fingers until the sticky coating loosens, and dry them.
Each seed has a hard-ish outer coat, and the part you are after is the small kernel inside, so expect to crack or nibble past a shell. Roast the seeds in a low oven or a dry pan until they are crisp, as you would sunflower seeds. Foragers describe the taste as mild and nutty. Each fruit holds a lot of seeds, but they are small, so expect a modest handful for your effort. Try just a few the first time in case they disagree with you.
Handling Horse Apples Without Skin Irritation
Picking up a whole fruit is generally fine. The trouble is the sticky, milky sap that the fruit and stems contain.27FOX 2 St. Louis. What Are Horse Apples and Are They Edible?28Missouri Department of Conservation. Osage Orange It can irritate the skin,29Missouri Department of Conservation. Osage Orange and in some people the irritation is an allergic skin reaction.30pollen.com. Osage-Orange (Maclura) Genus Level details and Allergy Info Wear gloves when you cut, break or clean up split fruit.
If sap gets on you, wash the area right away with soap and warm water, because the sticky sap won’t rinse off with water alone. Redness or itching where it touched is possible. See a doctor if a rash spreads or blisters, or if sap gets in an eye.
For a yard full of fallen fruit, pick up whole fruit before it rots, since split fruit leaks more sap. Use gloves, a shovel or a rake rather than bare hands. Keep children from smashing the fruit as a game, which sprays sap.
Reactions vary a lot. One person can handle fruit bare-handed with no trouble while another gets an itchy rash from the same contact. People who know they react to latex or to other milky-sapped plants have good reason to wear gloves from the start. A reaction may also appear later in the day or the next day rather than the moment sap touches skin.
Horse Apples and Livestock or Pets
Hedge apples aren’t known to be toxic to horses.31PetMD. Can Horses Eat Apples?32Petstore.com. Can Horses Eat Apples? A Vet-Informed Guide to Safe Amounts and Hidden The risk is choking. Cattle sometimes try to swallow the fruit whole, and because it can be bigger than a softball, it can lodge in the throat and suffocate them.33Kentucky Equine Research. Hedge Apples and Horses Horses can choke the same way,34Kentucky Equine Research. Hedge Apples and Horses and they often pick up fallen fruit from the ground on their own.35Petstore.com. Can Horses Eat Apples? A Vet-Informed Guide to Safe Amounts and Hidden At some times of year the fruit is also prone to mold.36PetMD. Can Horses Eat Apples? So clear the fruit from pastures and fence lines, or remove fruiting trees near grazing areas.37Kentucky Equine Research. Hedge Apples and Horses
A choking horse may cough, drool, stretch its neck, or have food coming from its nose. Cattle may bloat, drool and show distress. Call a vet at once, because choking is an emergency. While you wait, take away any feed and water, since swallowing can push more material toward the blockage. Keep the animal calm in a quiet spot, because panic and movement can make things worse. Don’t reach into the throat or push the fruit down yourself, as this can injure you or the animal.
Large dogs may chew or carry the fruit, which brings the same choking risk. Moldy fruit can upset a pet’s stomach. Pick up fallen fruit in the areas where pets play.
Why So Few Animals Eat Horse Apples
Squirrels will eat the seeds, but they rarely carry the fruit far,38The American Midland Naturalist. Seed Dispersal in Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera) by Squirrels (Sciurus spp.) so a squirrel feeding on a hedge apple is an uncommon sight.39The American Midland Naturalist. Seed Dispersal in Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera) by Squirrels (Sciurus spp.) In one test, the seeds didn’t survive passing through a horse’s gut, and passing through an elephant gave them no benefit.40Southeastern Naturalist. A Test of Potential Pleistocene Mammal Seed Dispersal in Anachronistic Fruits using Extant Ecological and Physiological Analogs With no animal to swallow it and carry it off, fallen fruit simply decays near the tree. The fruit looks like a leftover from a time when mammoth-sized animals may have eaten it whole.
The idea is that large plant-eating mammals of the last ice age, such as mammoths and giant ground sloths, once ate the fruit whole and spread the seeds in their dung. Scientists find this plausible, but nobody can watch it happen, because those animals are gone. Fruits like this seem matched to animals that no longer exist.
Do Hedge Apples Repel Spiders and Insects
Concentrated hedge apple extract discouraged brown recluse spiders from nesting when they could choose another spot.41Kansas State University. Hedge Apples – Brown Recluse Spiders – and Basements – OH MY!! The finding is that spiders avoided the extract, not that they were killed or driven out of a house. A whole fruit in a basement is not the same as a concentrated extract, so treat hedge apples as an untested home remedy and rely on sealing cracks and reducing clutter.
Indoors, the fruit softens, rots and grows mold within weeks. Leaking sap can stain surfaces and irritate skin. If you try it anyway, set the fruit on a dish and replace it often.
What does work is sealing gaps around doors, windows and pipes, and clearing boxes and clutter where spiders hide. Sticky traps show whether spiders are present at all.
Other Uses for the Fruit and the Tree
The wood is the real prize. The heartwood is golden-yellow to bright orange and darkens over time.42USDA Forest Service Research Paper. Osage-Orange It is among the most rot-resistant North American woods and ranks high for strength and hardness.43USDA Forest Service Research Paper. Osage-Orange It is prized for fence posts and hunting bows, which gave it the name bow-wood.44Substack. Foraging for Osage oranges It should be worked while still green, because dry wood dulls tools like bone.45USDA Forest Service Research Paper. Osage-Orange
Fence posts made from it can stay in the ground for decades. Its density also made it a favorite for tool handles.
The fruit is rich in plant compounds, and one of them is a strong antioxidant in lab tests.46PubMed. Antioxidant isoflavones in Osage orange, Maclura pomifera (Raf.) Schneid. Fruit extracts are also being studied for possible use in cosmetics.47Flavour and Fragrance Journal. Maclura Fruit as a Rich Source of Triglycerides and Triterpenes and Valuable Material for Cosmetic Products This lab work doesn’t make the flesh good to eat.
If you’re thinking of removing a tree, the heavy wood makes excellent firewood and fence posts, though it can spark when burned. Thorny branches call for gloves and eye protection. Some nurseries sell thornless male trees that drop no fruit.