..brainiacs!

Each day on my way to work on a certain stretch of road  I see green fruit laying along the side, even falling from the tree and some even run over by cars. I had never seen this fruit or nut or vegetable before and they certainly had the strangest look....like bright green brains. Whatever could they be?

For a month now I have been wondering about these things and lo and behold I walked into the young toddler room this week and there were some in a basket! I learned that they are hedge apples, one of the teachers call them hedge balls. I learned that they are good to put in a basement or wherever you have spiders, roaches, ants, insects and crickets! Since they are a repellant I decided to try it out! We have crickets. They sing us to sleep and keep us awake at the oddest times. They are loud little critters. So hedge apples to the rescue, I hope!

They are not poisonous and they actually come from the Osage orange tree. What puzzles me is that they come from the orange tree and they are neither orange or even citrus. The Osage orange tree is actually a cousin of the mulberry tree. Having grown up in Pennsylvania I am puzzled as to why I have never seen them before. Maybe they are a Phillie thing! When I googled the hedge apple, I learned they are seen in Oklahoma, Texas, and Virginia can boast as to having the largest Osage orange tree in the nation.

I just wish I had them in Jamaica. We dealt with thousands of ants, hundreds of cockroaches and little critters there! It is rumored that WWII soldiers ate these hedge apples because of food shortage. Martha Stewart has even made autumn crafts from these apples....um....oranges...oh man I just don't know what to call them! I think I will stick to calling them green brains!