Osage Oranges

We visited Tower Grove Park for the first time since we’ve returned to town and also the first time since last week’s derecho. There were many downed trees in the park. You could tell that the park’s maintenance crew had been very busy, but were still swamped with all of their work of cleaning up after the storm. They had cleared all of the roads and paths, but many of the felled trees that weren’t in the way had yet to be addressed. An Osage Orange tree had been one of the casualties. Part of it was still precariously standing, but much of it had already been sawed up into logs. Someone had taken this tree’s final season of fruit and piled it up for me to photograph for you. Rather considerate of them.

Osage Oranges are indigenous to the area. The florescent green fruit is suppose to be good at warding off insects. They are kind of a fragile tree, so it doesn’t surprise me that this one succumbed to the storm’s wind. What is surprising is that nearby is an older more fragile looking Osage Orange that escaped without any damage. Long before the gardeners had braced one of this ones limbs with 2×4s. Even that limb escaped unscathed. It is really more of a shrub than a tree and is closely related to the mulberry. Early settlers would severely prune the Osage, which then generated numerous offshoots. These shoots were woven to create a wicker fence that typically was planted around gardens, to keep the livestock out. This practice was superseded by the invention of barbwire. 

Yesterday, the florescent light in the bathroom suddenly stopped working. I replaced its bulb, but no joy. I replaced its starter and likewise. The only thing left to replace was the ballast, but I didn’t have a replacement for that. So, I replaced the entire fixture. It was old when we bought the house and now its plexiglass cover has turned yellow and is cracked. It was time for it to go. I ordered a similar LED fixture from Amazon that should arrive latter this week. I took down the old fixture and scraped the loose paint behind it. I’ll repaint the area where the old fixture sat and everything should be ready for the new one. I guess you could this a popup project. It was unexpected. It just happened.