# Looking for some Osage trees



## Glenn (Jan 17, 2008)

Anyone have any Osage trees that they would like to get rid of?

Wanting to cut some for bow wood...

Will travel...


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## potsticker (Jan 17, 2008)

Well we are loaded with mock orange trees. Some say it is osage orange, has fruit about the size of golf balls. While it is full of thorns, the limbs are too small to make a bow out of, ill ask nic.


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## Glenn (Jan 17, 2008)

The wood I would use  would be from the stem or trunk.


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## Just 1 More (Jan 17, 2008)

We just got permission to hunt about 600 acres in Kansas and about 120 acres is an old Osage orange grove.. more bow wood in there than you can cut


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## Glenn (Jan 17, 2008)

Yeah lots of it out there and to far for me to drive.


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## Al33 (Jan 17, 2008)

This past Spring I planted about 2 gallons of Osage Orange mush full of seeds on our property in Gordon County. Of course I will likely be dead and gone before they are old enough to harvest for bows but hopefully someone will one day. I brought back a half dozen oranges I picked up on an Illinois hunt in '06. I let them rot during the winter in a 5 gallon bucket with water.

I know this isn't much help to you, just chattin'.

Might be easer to just buy a stave. Here is just one of several suppliers.
http://www.osagestaves.com/

Good luck Glenn.


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## Resica (Jan 17, 2008)

I see em growing around here in Pa.That's a little far for ya too.


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## notnksnemor (Jan 18, 2008)

I still have a lot of contacts  in Ks. 
Someone might be willing to ship to you if you can give a description of what you're looking for, length, diameter, etc.

Rick


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## Glenn (Jan 18, 2008)

Al33 said:


> This past Spring I planted about 2 gallons of Osage Orange mush full of seeds on our property in Gordon County. Of course I will likely be dead and gone before they are old enough to harvest for bows but hopefully someone will one day. I brought back a half dozen oranges I picked up on an Illinois hunt in '06. I let them rot during the winter in a 5 gallon bucket with water.
> 
> I know this isn't much help to you, just chattin'.
> 
> ...



Yeah I might have to do that Al or use a different wood. i have plenty of Hophornbeam and Hickory around my area.


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## Glenn (Jan 18, 2008)

NOTNKSNEMOR said:


> I still have a lot of contacts  in Ks.
> Someone might be willing to ship to you if you can give a description of what you're looking for, length, diameter, etc.
> 
> Rick



Appreciate the offer but I'm sure shipping would be the killer of the deal.


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## OkieHunter (Jan 18, 2008)

We have allot of them around our hunting lease but I'm afraid shipping would be a little excessive.


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## FVR (Jan 18, 2008)

Email Billy, he is located up here around me and has a mess of it he wants to get rid off.

bigbad93@aol.com

Road trip.


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## Wornout Trails (Jan 19, 2008)

*Osage Orange Tree*

I have an 100 year old + Osage Orange tree on my Farm.  People who planted it were from Texas and owned this property back in 1800's.  If you have never tried sawing or cutting into an "Iron Wood" tree, well it makes cutting Oak wood cut like butter.  
Any way here is a picture of the tree.  The greenish "brain like" fruit is as big as a grapefruit or softball.  Indians used them for dye and the wood for making excellent bows.
This is the only tree of this type that I have seen in N. Ga.

                       W.T.


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## Al33 (Jan 19, 2008)

Wow! That's a biggun'. I used to kill squirrels out of one about that size in Duncanville Texas. It was located on the edge of a huge field and there was a trail through the woods leading up to it. I would sneak my way up that trail and watch for the falling particles of the orange. That told me there was a squirrel high up on a limb somewhere cutting the fruit apart to get to the core and eat it. Many times I found circles of fruit parts on the ground about the size of hoola hoops where a squirrel had eaten it apart from above.

I see a lot of bow staves in that old tree. As a kid we would just cut Osage limbs about one inch in diameter, peel the bark, let 'em dry out in the garage, then shape them into bows with a draw knife. We called them Horse Apple trees in Texas. Interesting story on how it got there.


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## Nicodemus (Jan 19, 2008)

potsticker said:


> Well we are loaded with mock orange trees. Some say it is osage orange, has fruit about the size of golf balls. While it is full of thorns, the limbs are too small to make a bow out of, ill ask nic.




Naw Potsticker, they`re two separate trees. They both have some fearsome thorns though, don`t they!


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## horsecreek (Jan 24, 2008)

well just ask the guy below to buy a small branch off his tree...plenty to spare on that big thang...


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## potsticker (Jan 24, 2008)

Thanks nic, i figured those things were good for nuthing. Even the rabbits wont eat them. i once thought our place wuz loaded with ash trees, not,  elm.


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## sweston (Jan 25, 2008)

potsticker said:


> Thanks nic, i figured those things were good for nuthing. Even the rabbits wont eat them. i once thought our place wuz loaded with ash trees, not,  elm.



Mock Orange refers to at least two different plants depending in what part of the country you are in.  One is really just a bush.  
If it has these on it it should be the same as an osage orange. 






Here is a good link to it provided by the United States Forest Service Osage Orange

according to the link it "has been planted in greater numbers than almost any other tree species in North America. Known also as hedge, hedge-apple, bodark, bois-d'arc, bowwood, and naranjo chino, it made agricultural settlement of the prairies possible (though not profitable), led directly to the invention of barbed wire, and then provided most of the posts for the wire that fenced the West. The heartwood, bark, and roots contain many extractives of actual and potential value in food processing, pesticide manufacturing, and dyemaking. "


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## GAnaturalist (Jan 25, 2008)

*Mulberry*

A good alternative would be Mulberry, Morus rubra. In John Lawson's journals (a early surveyor of the carolinas 1600's) he wrote that the Catawaba's of South Carolina said they preferred Mulberry to any other type of wood for bow making. Seconds were Black Locust then Hickory. 

Mulberry heartwood is dark like Walnut, nice wood, can be two tone.

People have mentioned that the wood is very similiar to the qualities of Osage. Me, I just like aged Hickory, and I am working on some Ash splits that I want to sinew back. 

Someday I would like to try them all.


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## Auchumpkee Creek Assassin (Jan 26, 2008)

wornout trails...nice osage tree


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## ShawnD (Feb 19, 2008)

*osage trees*

go to the redlands wma, road 9 behind "The Homeplace" next to the well.  That's the only place I've found them.  Good luck





Glenn said:


> Anyone have any Osage trees that they would like to get rid of?
> 
> Wanting to cut some for bow wood...
> 
> Will travel...


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## 60Grit (Feb 19, 2008)

ShawnD said:


> go to the redlands wma, road 9 behind "The Homeplace" next to the well. That's the only place I've found them. Good luck


 


Don't get caught....!!!

The last Osage Orange trees I saw were up around Monticello. Not sure I could find them again, it was years ago.

Someone mentioned using Mulberry. Maclura pomifera is in the Mulberry family, but not sure that the Mulberry is as stubborn and tenacious of a wood as the Osage is.

Here's mine.

View attachment 118197


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## t wayne (Feb 21, 2008)

Got plenty of them up here in TN.  Come on up.

Or I'll look into shipping some down to you if you'll let me know what you need


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## 69camaro (Feb 21, 2008)

Wornout Trails said:


> I have an 100 year old + Osage Orange tree on my Farm.  People who planted it were from Texas and owned this property back in 1800's.  If you have never tried sawing or cutting into an "Iron Wood" tree, well it makes cutting Oak wood cut like butter.
> Any way here is a picture of the tree.  The greenish "brain like" fruit is as big as a grapefruit or softball.  Indians used them for dye and the wood for making excellent bows.
> This is the only tree of this type that I have seen in N. Ga.
> 
> W.T.



I found a couple on Lake Russel WMA. Only ones I've ever seen in the area. Its neat you have one and know the history how it got there.


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