An Old Piece of Osage Orange History. Mid West

Just want to add my email address at the begining of each blog post write to: osagemann@yahoo.com if you have any questions.

Just thought I would add these pics and share the story behind this piece of wood and utensils. I cut this piece of Osage about a month ago. I had cut there many times before, but somehow I had overlooked this particular “small” Osage tree.

I cut it off at the bottom and the first thing I noticed was how tight the growth rings were. I had to count them with a magnifying glass to make sure I didn’t miss any. I layed a ruler on the wood to give you a sense of size. It is 7 inches form center to the outer growth ring. I thought maybe there would be 50 when I started counting. At first the rings weren’t that close together. But as the tree grew it became shadowed by the other trees around it, which didn’t allow the sun to reach it very well. I got to 100 and I still wasn’t done counting. This tree is 110 years old and only 7 inches. which means, it averaged only 1 iinch of growth for every 15.7 years. Whats even more remarkable about this tree is. I started thinking about when it started growing. First of all, I had to make an educated guess on how long it had been dead. From the look of the outside of this piece, I guessed that it had been dead at least 40 years… 110+40= 150 years. This tree started growing around the year, 1859…

It started growing before the Cival War started. So then I did some more digging. Osage at that time came from the red river valley in N. Texas and Oklahoma. It came as seed in the form of Osage Orange apples. (Google, Osage Orange and you’ll see what one looks like) Under the little bumps on the balls are the seed of the Osage tree. Most balls have over 100 seeds . They were brought by wagon and sold for use as seed to start a fence row A bushel basket of Osage balls sold for $40. That was a lot of money for that time.

Lewis & Clark were the 1st to bring the Osage to the midwest. Could this be one of the original seeds that Lewis & Clark brought with them on their journey??? Something to think about, And you now know, “the rest, of the story” as Paul Harvey would say. For those of you that don’t know; Mr Paul Harvey passed away this last week. I always enjoyed listening to him bring the news. He was, a “master” of story telling… Good Day!

Are the utensils I made from this wood for sale ? NO WAY. I might donate one for Lumber Jocks to give away if they like.

The utensils pictured were made from this particular piece. (1 very large ladle,19” and 2 tea spoons, 6”1/2) The log was around 10 feet in total length.

I’m begining to enjoy writting in this blog. Hope you enjoy it also, Good day!!!

-- The Osage Tree