vharrison
Island Girl
Edible?
The Tree ID Thread
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Steve Mack
Life Member.
Thank you, there was about twenty of them there. It's an old place and a lot of big trees, mostly pine from Europe planted after WW1, but there are some others but no leaves at the moment.
There was one that looked like this. Maclura pomifera - Plant Finder - http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?kempercode=a879
There was one that looked like this. Maclura pomifera - Plant Finder - http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?kempercode=a879
Not that I'm aware of. I heard somewhere the fruit was designed for dinosaurs. With the dinosaurs gone, their method of propagation became defunct. I don't run into them often, but it's a fun tree. We always called the fruits monkey balls. Good firewood, and I believe the inside is interesting for milling if you can find a straight piece.
Nutball
TreeHouser
Hedge Apple
More interesting if you find a twisty piece.
More interesting if you find a twisty piece.
A hedge post will last close to forever, but you a can't drive a staple in on much past a couple years if you have to replace the fence. Squirrels love the fruit and do a lot of distribution. Dirr described the fruit as ripe in September and deadly in October when they fall. would be a very nice shade tree as they are too tough to kill, except for the thorns. There was an inermis variety but these still seemed to develop thorns in later years. That little 1/4 inch thorn will work its way clear through a large tractor tire due to its wedge shape. Once native only to the Osage country where Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas meet. Also called an Osage Orange.
Anyone know what this is?
Pics were taken in spring. I was hoping to get back out there so I could see it fully leafed, but I don't know when that's gonna happen. It's almost certainly non native, but I'm considering bordering my right property line with it. That's the side with the irritating neighbors, and that's a "frig you" shrub if I ever saw one.
Pics were taken in spring. I was hoping to get back out there so I could see it fully leafed, but I don't know when that's gonna happen. It's almost certainly non native, but I'm considering bordering my right property line with it. That's the side with the irritating neighbors, and that's a "frig you" shrub if I ever saw one.
I don't think so, based on an image search anyway. This doesn't strike me as the kind of plant that really turns into a tree. Looks like it generates a tangle of impenetrable awful. I only saw two of these, and I'm 90% sure they escaped cultivation, or woodland grew up around them, so perhaps they get flowers, or something else interesting? There weren't enough for security purposes, and it doesn't look like much based on the stems.
Nutball
TreeHouser
Citrus?
Highly unlikely in MD. It was growing in a woods-like area. This is in the same place as the Mahonia I asked about awhile ago. They either escaped from the very old house, or the area was more manicured in years past, and went feral. There were flowers here and there in the area, and stuff that looked like it could have been a yard tree in different circumstances.
An image search brought up some stuff that looked similar, but most were from arid regions. It's an unusual choice to plant unless it gets some nice flowers or something. Those thorns are vicious, and would make a good security hedge, but I only saw the two plants. That doesn't eliminate the possibility they escaped from a hedge. The sorta newer houses around the old one were probably cut from the old house's property, so I couldn't say what it used to look like there. I'd estimate the old house was lower end upper class back in the day, so importing "special" plants wouldn't be out of character.
An image search brought up some stuff that looked similar, but most were from arid regions. It's an unusual choice to plant unless it gets some nice flowers or something. Those thorns are vicious, and would make a good security hedge, but I only saw the two plants. That doesn't eliminate the possibility they escaped from a hedge. The sorta newer houses around the old one were probably cut from the old house's property, so I couldn't say what it used to look like there. I'd estimate the old house was lower end upper class back in the day, so importing "special" plants wouldn't be out of character.
Mellow
BCMA
Nutball
TreeHouser
That's where my citrus guess came from. I saw an ad for one of those on google images just searching for a plant with big thorny stems.
I wonder how animals are supposed to spread the seeds when it protects the fruit so well?
Marc-Antoine
TreeHouser
I guess the thorns are for (against) the big mammals. The small birds doesn't seem to care. Actually, they love these tangled nasty mess. Pyracantha is a good one too. They are even denser when conducted as an hedge, and there are still bird's nests in them.
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Nutball
TreeHouser
Unfortunately I didn't get any pictured of it, but I was around a few new to me trees last week. One had light grey bark, and had characteristics of a deciduous softwood. There were what looked like nut clusters hanging from it, almost like pecans. The brown shells still hanging on the tree appeared to have split and reclosed as they were hollow with a single smooth divider. I found some green ones, that when opened had hundreds of little white seeds which appeared similar in shape to elm seeds, but smaller. If I remember correctly, the leaves reminded me of cottonwood, but the tree looked nothing like the tall straight cottonwoods with dark deeply fissured bark like I'm used to seeing. I was thinking maybe some spade leaved paulownia since I had no idea what it was, but it might be some less common variety of cottonwood.
I think this kind of looks like what I saw: Plant Identification: CLOSED: Tree with small, white seeds in round green pods - Zone 8, 3 by onalee - https://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=10264987&extraimg=1#b
Another tree I saw may have had bark similar to a gum tree, appeared to be a soft or medium density wood. It had magnolia sized or longer, but not as dark of green pointed spear shaped leaves. Near white wood.
I think this kind of looks like what I saw: Plant Identification: CLOSED: Tree with small, white seeds in round green pods - Zone 8, 3 by onalee - https://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=10264987&extraimg=1#b
Another tree I saw may have had bark similar to a gum tree, appeared to be a soft or medium density wood. It had magnolia sized or longer, but not as dark of green pointed spear shaped leaves. Near white wood.
Nutball
TreeHouser
What kind is this tree?
Deciduous, it has very white wood, heartwood color unknown. It has a wound with hardened sap around the edges, with a color and smell resembling yellow pine. Sucker growth from near the base of the trunk like some softwoods like to do. The wood has no noticeable smell, the smell and taste of the hardened sap is very weak, but pleasant. When the resin is burned like incense, it very strongly resembles, what I call white benzoin, but I'm not sure because there may be different kinds of benzoin, one of which looks like a grey aggregate like cement that smells much different than what I call white benzoin, which is evenly white opaque resin. This resin is a clear gold. I'm kinda big into resin incense BTW.
Maybe it is related to sweet gum? I have no experience with sweet gum resin. I have cut many gum trees this year, but they had much darker bark, small diameter dark heartwood, spikey balls and star leaves. I'm not sure how many different gum trees there are around here. This was growing among many of those dark gum trees, many tulip poplars and sassafras, but I only saw this one of it's kind. I even found 2 beech trees there, which beech is rare in my area, actually I didn't know there was any in my area.
Deciduous, it has very white wood, heartwood color unknown. It has a wound with hardened sap around the edges, with a color and smell resembling yellow pine. Sucker growth from near the base of the trunk like some softwoods like to do. The wood has no noticeable smell, the smell and taste of the hardened sap is very weak, but pleasant. When the resin is burned like incense, it very strongly resembles, what I call white benzoin, but I'm not sure because there may be different kinds of benzoin, one of which looks like a grey aggregate like cement that smells much different than what I call white benzoin, which is evenly white opaque resin. This resin is a clear gold. I'm kinda big into resin incense BTW.
Maybe it is related to sweet gum? I have no experience with sweet gum resin. I have cut many gum trees this year, but they had much darker bark, small diameter dark heartwood, spikey balls and star leaves. I'm not sure how many different gum trees there are around here. This was growing among many of those dark gum trees, many tulip poplars and sassafras, but I only saw this one of it's kind. I even found 2 beech trees there, which beech is rare in my area, actually I didn't know there was any in my area.
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Mellow
BCMA
Some kind of poplar, perhaps? Where are you?
Nutball
TreeHouser
Wilson county TN
Nutball
TreeHouser
This was by a lake, 50ft from the edge. 8-11" diameter, 30-40ft tall.
SeanKroll
Treehouser
Scale in you pic helps a lot.
I was guessing it was thicker diameter than it is, from the first pic.
I was guessing it was thicker diameter than it is, from the first pic.
gf beranek
Old Schooler
Looks like a cotonwood, or poplar sort.
Mellow
BCMA
Cottonwood! Couldn't think of that name. We don't have them here in Florida, or in New Jersey where I grew up.
That was one I looked up, but the bark looked a bit different in the pics. The fairly close up shot threw me off, and it was hard to get a good feel for what it looked like as a whole. If that trunk pic was shown with no other context, I'd have guessed some kind of pine.
Dunno if you all know, but apparently cottonwood bark carving is a thing...
Dunno if you all know, but apparently cottonwood bark carving is a thing...
