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OSAGE (OH-sayj)

North American River
Indigenous people of North America
Type of orange
Common clues: Tributary of the Missouri; Lake of the Ozarks river; Relative of an Omaha; Missouri feeder; Inedible orange; Plains Indian; Indian or orange
Crossword puzzle frequency: 4 times a year
Video:
Osage River boat ride


The Osage River is a tributary of the Missouri River, approximately 360 mi (579 km) long, in central Missouri in the United States. The largest river entirely in Missouri, it drains a rural area of 15,300 sq mi (39,600 km²) on the north edge of the Ozark Mountains west to east across Missouri, with its watershed stretching into eastern Kansas. It is impounded in two major locations such that most of the river has been converted into a chain of two reservoirs, the Harry S. Truman Reservoir and the Lake of the Ozarks.



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The Osage Nation is a Native American tribe in the United States, which is mainly based in Osage County, Oklahoma, but can still be found throughout America.




The Osage called themselves Wazházhe, Children of the Middle Water. The name Osage comes from a French corruption of the tribal name.

Their Osage language belongs to the Siouan branch of the Hokan-Siouan stock of Native American languages, now spoken in Nebraska and Oklahoma. They originally lived among the Kansa, the Ponca, the Omaha, and the Quapaw in the Ohio Valley. The tribe probably separated from the closely-related Kansa not long before Europeans first encountered them. The Osage developed a typical Plains Indian culture with a distinctive tribal division between meat-eating Wazhazhe and vegetarian Tsishu.

Many of the Osage had migrated to the Osage River in western Missouri by 1673, living near the Missouri River. Alongside the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache, they dominated over western Oklahoma. They also lived with the Quapaw and Caddo in Arkansas.


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Osage-orange, Horse-apple, Bois D'Arc, or Bodark (Maclura pomifera) is a small deciduous tree or large shrub, typically growing to 8–15 metres (26–49 ft) tall. It is dioeceous, with male and female flowers on different plants. The fruit, a multiple fruit, is roughly spherical, but bumpy, and 7–15 cm in diameter, and it is filled with a sticky white latex sap. In fall, its color turns a bright yellow-green and it has a faint odor similar to that of oranges. It is not closely related to the citrus fruit called an orange: Maclura belongs to the mulberry family, Moraceae, while oranges belong to the family Rutaceae.




Maclura is closely related to the genus Cudrania, and hybrids between the two genera have been produced. In fact, some botanists recognize a more broadly defined Maclura that includes species previously included in Cudrania and other genera of Moraceae.


Osajin and Pomiferin are flavonoid pigments present in the wood and fruit, comprising about 10% of the fruit's dry weight. The plant also contains the flavonol morin.


Recent research suggests that elemol, another component extractable from the fruit, shows promise as a mosquito repellent with similar activity to DEET in contact and residual repellency.




This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Osage River", “Maclura_pomifera”, and “Osage Nation”