Alright y’all, what is it? Found near San Antonio Texas at the edge of the hill country. When I first saw this I thought it was invasive chinaberry, but upon closer inspection it is something completely different. I saw this plant a little more than a month ago and the fruits looked like bright orange/yellow tiny little fuzzy peaches. There were a lot of these trees in the area and none of them were very tall. The tallest was maybe 15ft. Nothing appears to be eating these fruits because they’re all still here and are drying out, so I’m not sure that this is native. The fruit has become transparent as it dried. The seed inside is large, shiny, and black/dark brown. I didn’t inspect the fruit or seed further because I didn’t have gloves or a way to wash my hands, but it appears to be a single seed. Please tell me this is a native that I have somehow overlooked for years and it’s not an invasive blight on the hill country, because it was literally everywhere.
by CurrentPlankton4880
2 Comments
This is – Soapberry. I saw these trees growing in the wild in Texas when I went there a few years ago to visit a distant relative.
Soapberry is native to the southwestern US. The name ‘soap’ is due to the saponins in those berries that when put in warm water and agitated/rubbed together produce a soapy lather. Needless to say, they’re inedible.
Check out this video if you’d like to be fascinated by them producing soap –
https://youtu.be/Sv3vIm-bKys?si=eweJuvrYdGACZ3K1
We did this in our relative’s house as a fun experiment, and it was a hit! 🙂
[Western soapberry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapindus_drummondii). Native, larval host to at least [one hairstreak butterfly](https://bugguide.net/node/view/198380).