I get calls every year about the availability of black locust at the nursery I work at. They cannot be sold in the state of WI. On the restricted list. If people have them they can keep them just illegal to transport them to another site.
Many who call seem to be bee keepers who love it for the flowers. One sells black locust honey near me. I bought a jar and found it to be a light colored honey and worked well for my honey wheat bread. The bee keeper told me that black locust flowers are very important to his bees at the time of year they bloom as not much else available at that time for them?
I am no bee expert but the black locust honey was good!
I donāt know if it was on this thread or another, but I had shared somewhere on here about a neighbor who has Purple Robe black locust. They are incredibly invasive (though quite attractive) on his place. My wife wanted me to dig some up from the ditch and plant them here. Having dealt with regular black locust on my old place, I assured her there was no way in he!! that was going to happen.
I really donāt see many of them in this area. Lots of honey locust the city must have planted decades ago (big trees now). My brother who owns land in central WI said he doesnāt have any on his land that he can tell (they just logged a few years ago). Iām surprised they are so invasive. Must be more in the s Central/southern part of the state.
Thinking about itā¦there are some near the Mississippi River growing along the bike trail. Maybe they need lots of water?
If youāve driven I90/94 near the Dells you should have seen acres of black locust in the ROW. I do see somebody (DOT?) sprays them with something now and then, but another bunch will just get started outside of the spray zone.
My folksā old place in Juneau County, WI had plenty of them as well. None were ever planted, they just showed up on their own.
i would never plant them in a home landscape because of them spreading from the roots but thought of interplanting them with say red oak in a forest setting. both are fairly quick growing hardwoods, valuable for wood working or high-quality firewood. could plant on depleted farmland and the black locust would fix N and help the oak over time. both produce food sources for animals and the locust never needs replanting.
Purple robe is not quite so invasive as itās PARENTS. I recommend it and have planted itā¦
none of those
folks have complainedā¦nor
have had any invasive root shoots or seeds.
Purple Robe is indeed a very pretty tree. When planted in such an environment as the pic you posted, Iām sure there is no invasiveness. Iād imagine in such an environment mowing the surrounding area is an at least weekly, if not bi-weekly occurrence. Out here in the sticks, thereās plenty of ground that never gets mowed. Thatās the kind of area that black locust (and itās cultivars) love.
I have been around black locusts many timesā¦but the Purple Robe does not appear to have the problems of either species it is cossed from.
(I guess someday I could change my mindā¦)
Iāve a sneaking suspicion that osage orange is an all-or-nothing proposition. It either fails to grow, or it becomes so invasive that you despair of ever getting rid of it. Just so you know: Not very many people maintain an admiration for it for long after living around it.
The only animal that eats the fruit is mastodon. If you have a herd, youāll need the trees for forage; otherwise, not. Biologists are of the opinion that way back in geologic time osage orange was propagated by mammalian megafauna ingesting the seed and carrying it off. That may have been the case. Nowadays, however, the tree mostly sprouts vegetatively from the root.
The thorns, alluded to elsewhere, are ferocious enough to ruin tractor tires. Be advised!
In pioneer days, promoters of osage orange abounded. Their premise was that it could be planted in rows and would fill in quickly enough and thick enough to turn cattle, forming a living hedge row, and thereafter would not spread into the fields on either side. This tribute site does not make the point, but the propensity of osage orange to spread in all directions is readily apparent from the Iowa photos posted about half-way down.
Farmers unlucky enough to purchase or inherit land with osage orange infestation have found it necessary to bulldoze it out ā not just once but repeatedly over a decade or more because it comes up from the roots. Think about that! What do you do with a mixed pile of dirt, stumps, green branches, and thorns? Set fire to it of course! A week or two later after the stench dies down, youāll begin to doubt the fabulous stores of how well osage orange burns because youāll have to turn around and dig a pit big enough to bury all of it.
You forgot to advise on making carvings from the lovely orange trunks/roots?
You then could have mentioned having to sharpen the blade of your knife so many times you go through a knife every three days!
Just kidding. Itās not nearly as bad here in the Bluegrass as callery pear seedlings in every untended field and roadside.
Squirrels eat OO seeds. Cows will eat bletted OO fruitsā¦ but sometimes, if not chewed adequately, they lodge in their esophagus, causing potentially-fatal bloat and asphyxiation.
Invasive potential is orders of magnitude less than that of callery pear.
Borers frequently attack black locust here, so exhibit varying degrees of rot/hollowness, and often decline and die before they reach trunk diameters exceeding 8-10 inches.
Iāve watched deer eat hedge apples from osage orange trees. I donāt think it tops their preference list, but they will certainly eat it at times. Osage orange is a very dense wood and will stump sprout if cut. Iāve use triclophyr and diesel mix after cutting them down.
Black locust is a pioneer species with disturbed soil. Most open areas at my place are taken over by black locust, cedar or autumn olive.
I was walking past the neighborās this morning and a bunch of his purple robe black locust suckers are blooming. Not a great pic, but I wasnāt going to walk on his place without prior permission. Further into his land thereās 100 times more of the stuffā¦and thatās after years of his fighting the stuff.
