Why would anyone pay for inedible fruit? At some point, this ugly fruit developed the reputation for keeping spiders and other insects out of people's basements. Supposedly, all you need to do is place them outside your home around the foundation or spread them around the basement for them to effectively repel all types of pests.

However, there is no scientific evidence that supports these claims. For as many testimonials that attest to how well Osage oranges work in controlling spiders and other insects, there are just as many people who say they are not effective. (Interestingly, scientific research has discovered in laboratory studies that the essential oil of Osage orange is repellent to German cockroaches. However this does not explain why using whole, intact Osage orange fruits would control spiders and insects as some people claim.)

"Osage oranges" and "Hedge apples" are just two of several common names given to these peculiar fruits. "Hedge ball" is another. We first leaned about Osage oranges when people brought a few back from Iowa or Nebraska and wanted the Yard & Garden Clinic to identify them.

Not only are these unusual fruits the size and shape of oranges, with tough leathery skin, they turn yellow-orange when they're fully ripe. That's where the comparison ends, though. Osage oranges are hard and woody, through and through. They are definitely not edible.

Osage oranges develop on a rough, thorny tree botanically known as Maclura pomifera. They are hardy only from southern Iowa on southward, which is why the fruit appears so foreign to most Minnesotans. We don't even attempt to grow them here.

Originally planted in hedge rows to mark property lines and keep cattle in, Osage orange trees are still a fairly common sight along roadsides in rural Nebraska, Kansas and Arkansas. However, the trees are not particularly valued as landscape plants due to their coarse appearance, thorny wood and messy habit of dropping these large, hard, heavy fruits each fall.