A bowdark tree and its fruit. "What's in a name?" the Bard demands. While Shakespeare's response is accurate (and make good poetry), a creature's name should serve as a guide to its biology, a key to its basic characteristics. The bowdark tree is blessed with many names, each one adding a vital part to its story.
Bowdarks are short, scraggly trees, easily overlooked in the landscape. The rather nondescript leaves--ovate to lance-shaped, three to five inches long and two to three inches wide-are borne on stout, thorny twigs. Like other members of the mulberry family (including true mulberries, figs, and breadfruit), bowdarks produce a juicy latex and a compound fruit, which is quite large. These fruits, brain-like in texture and grapefruit-sized, mature in late autumn, crashing to the ground with loud chumps.
Bowdarks are short, scraggly trees, easily overlooked in the landscape. The rather nondescript leaves--ovate to lance-shaped, three to five inches long and two to three inches wide-are borne on stout, thorny twigs. Like other members of the mulberry family (including true mulberries, figs, and breadfruit), bowdarks produce a juicy latex and a compound fruit, which is quite large. These fruits, brain-like in texture and grapefruit-sized, mature in late autumn, crashing to the ground with loud chumps.
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