osage orange

[c austin]

Hi, I was told osage orange grows around the Texas area I'm in VA and was told there is a osage orange at a local church that needs to bee taken down. Here in VA we have a weed tree called a malberry tree I think people are confusing the two trees or are they the same thing, what is a easy adinafier of the tree thanks.

[LeeB]

Same fammily but not the same thing. Both trees grow across a wide cross section of the country. The wood from each is very similar in my experiance. Both are a bright yellow when first cut and turn a golden brown with time and very hard stuff with osage being a little harder. Can't help you with the easy identification.

[SwampDonkey]

If Osage: Soak some of the heartwood in some warm/hot water and yellow dye color will bleed out. Tyloses (blocked pores) in earlywood pores, seen on end grain but not well defined. Very heavy wood and hard, 20% denser that mulberry. Leaf is pointed at apex, dark green and shiny, twigs are armed with sharp spines. Mulbery leaves are serrated along the edge and has many forms, from entire to 3 lobed.

[miking]

Short, stout thorns on the hedge (or osage orange) are an obvious difference as are the fruit. OO's have  green fleshy fruits fist sized or bigger while mulberries have small edible purple when ripe fruits.

[tractorfarmer]

And the thorns on the osage orange are only on the younger branches. They won't be on the trunk. Be careful, they are about one inch long and go through shoes easily. The green baseball sized fruit should be on the trees now and falling.
The mulberry can have white or red fruit. Usually early summer. If its red, the fruit will stain.
The oasage orange has a light color bark. And the mulberry has a much darker bark.
Both are nice trees, but I love osage orange. The wood is very hard and one of the most rot resistant. It can take a good hacking without being killed. I think they were native to Texas or Oklahoma, but were used in PA by farmers as fences before barbed wire was invented.

[Ironwood]

During the post Dust Bowl years FDR's conservation plans included planting shelter belt Osage throughout much of the temperete US, they planted some 250 million trees, beyond it native range in the Texas /Oklahoma areas. We have it here in Western Pa. FOR SURE, thanks FDR

 Ironwood (I love Osage wood)