This tree was planted by my grandfather, probably in the 1930s or 1940s in his garden in Essex, England - I have not been able to identify it. I now live next door to his old house and this tree has been mystifying me. The pictures I have provided do not unfortunately show the whole tree - it is not very accessible. It is only a small tree. I have not seen it in flower - I always seem to have missed this. The 'fruit' is about 10cm diameter. The branches have 3cm long spines every so often along the stem. The cut branches freely ooze white latex. I would be grateful for any clues and can take further pictures to help. Thanks
Thanks. This is not a common plant here in the UK but I now realise that it must be very familiar in US.
I am from where these are native--the blackland prairie of Northeast Texas. They were heavily planted to make fence rows before we had barbed wire. We call them horse apple trees or bois d'arc trees. Indians used them to make bows. We used to stick them on the end of sticks and fling them at each other. There are male and female trees. The wood is orange and pops a lot when it is burned. The female trees are the ones with thorns. Since your tree has fruit, there must be a male tree close by.
