My grandfather said the family used the pawpaw to kill mites and fleas, around the turn of the last century (1900s). It had medicinal properties for his older brother who had asthma. They made a poltice from the crush fruit, for skin irritations.
Interesting. Sounds like something that doesn’t grow up north.
No, hedgeballs are inedible of not poisonous. The center though is very anti-bacterial I guess.
Pawpaws are not poisonous at all- they are delicious, looking and tasting like vanilla custard inside but with great big dark seeds in them too. On the outside they are pale green and smooth, but bruise easily, like a banana does. Opossum and coons and deer, fox and everything, just love them.
The hedge apple, or Osage orange, looks a bit like a jackfruit in texture though instead of tightly packed conical protrusions, has packed lumpy rounded ones. It may also be related to the mulberry as are jackfruit. The fruit, the size of a grapefruit, has a long history of being used in closets and crawlspaces to repel mice and varmints, though I don’t think it will kill them as they don’t like it enough to eat it. To humans the scent is not objectionable. The thorny tree is also called Bow d’arc, a corruption of the French fur trader’s name for it, and was highly prized and spread by the Osage Indians for its excellent properties as a wood for making hunting bows and a form of village protection. It was further spread by farmers as a hedge for containing animals and as a windbreak. The wood is very rot resistant, the heartwood a bright orange. The fruit is considered inedible, but if it is because of taste or toxicity, I don’t know.
Paw paws are smooth, light green ripening to yellow and easily bruised, with the flesh inside a rich yellow, sometimes tinged with orange soft “custard,” a flavor like bananas mixed with a little mango, and large glossy black seeds. Flavor can vary between subspecies but it is always sweet and pleasant. It is not related to mulberry trees. It tends to grow well along creeks and in the gullies of bluffs along rivers.
Your relative must have been talking about the totally different fruit from the Bois d’arc tree/ bowdark/ horse apple / hedge Apple, or as it is most commonly known, the Osage orange. Like breadfruit and the tropical fruit in the article, Osage orange is a member of the mulberry family and the fruit similarly very knobby in texture, but is about the size of a large grapefruit or a bit smaller than a pummelo cateloupe. The seeds are edible, and squirrels go crazy for them; cattle and horses can eat them, too, but you have to be careful they can’t get to them without supervision to avoid choking. The fruits aren’t considered palatable for people, which is just too bad because they are huge, abundant, and unbothered by pests. Tradition says that putting them in a basement or closet will deter spiders and insects but in my experience, there is no truth to the claim. Osage orange trees are thorny and make great hedges, and so we’re planted widely from their native Oklahoma as windbreaks to prevent soul erosion in the aftermath of the Dust Bowl. The proliferation of Osage hedgerows was then a boon to nesting birds for they provide excellent cover from predators. The wood is beautifully and intensely colored, incredibly strong, flexible and rot and insect resistant. American Indians traditionally prized it for making bows and it is comparable to yew in that regard. Unfortunately people have forgotten the lessons of the Dust Bowl and we are losing the reliable Osage hedgerows.