[12] The fruit of the honey locust is a flat pod (a legume) that matures in early autumn and is often twisted or curved.

[4] Honey locust was given its scientific name of Gleditsia triacanthos by Carl Linnaeus in 1753 in his book Species Plantarum.

[2] In the midwest it grows in very widely in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Missouri and is much rarer and scattered in Wisconsin and Minnesota, North Dakota.

[30] In the eastern United States honey locust trees are regarded as native to Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and New York.

[3] Though the botanist Elbert Luther Little showed the range as extending naturally into Pennsylvania,[30] NatureServe list it as introduced to that state.

[2] Only World Plants lists it as native to many western states including Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming.

[21] The sweet pulp in honey locust seed pods is attractive as a food for many animals including cattle, deer, rabbits, squirrels, and hares.

[33] The size and number of thorns on the honey locust are thought to have evolved to protect the trees from browsing Pleistocene megafauna, including mastodons, which may also have been involved in seed dispersal.

[35] Honey locust trees are a frequent host for the parasitic plant American mistletoe (Phoradendron leucarpum), but usually is not infected by large numbers of them and without suffering obvious damage.

[36] Honey locust is one of the most successful of the trees and shrubs in the pea family at invading new habitats worldwide.

The thickets choke waterways and prevent both domestic and native animals from drinking and also harbour vermin.

It escaped from cultivation and has invaded native grasslands, subtropical montane forest (yungas), and woodlands of the Gran Chaco.

[37] In much of the Midwest of the United States the honey locust is also considered a weed tree and a pest that establishes itself in farm fields.

[40] In other regions of the world, ranchers and farmers who employ monocropping deem honey locust a nuisance weed; its fast growth allows it to out-compete grasses and other crops.

[41] The largest recorded in the American National Register of Champion Trees is one growing in Botetourt County, Virginia.

[50] This cultivar is shaped similarly to an American elm with a wide, spreading top and is also thornless and nearly pod free.

[46] It is a bushy tree with smaller leaflets with slow growth, only reaching about 4 meters (13 ft) when 25 years old.

[46] Trees have a straight trunk and branches that grow outward and then curve upward to create a symmetrical crown.

[54] Trees tend to have one or two larger leaders and evenly spaced branches with somewhat narrower crotch angles.

[54] Trees can be trimmed to develop one strong central leader with little pruning, because of this lower branches can be removed without distoring the even shape of the crown.

[46] The pulp on the inside of the pods is edible[59] (unlike the black locust, which is toxic)[60] and consumed by wildlife and livestock.

[4] The name derives from the sweet taste of the legume pulp, which was used for food and traditional medicine by Native American people, and can also be used to make tea.

[4] The long pods, which eventually dry and ripen to brown or maroon, are surrounded in a tough, leathery skin that adheres strongly to the pulp within.

[61] Honey locusts produce a high quality, durable wood that polishes well, but the tree does not grow in sufficient numbers to support a bulk industry.

In contrast, many popular sources, permaculture publications in particular, claim that Gleditsia does fix nitrogen but by some other mechanism.

[citation needed] There are anatomical, ecological, and taxonomic indications of nitrogen fixation in non-nodulating legumes.

[67] How this happens is not yet well understood but there have been some observations of nitrogenase activity in non-nodulating leguminous plants, including honey locust.

[66] Electron microscopy indicates the presence of clusters around the inner cortex of roots, just outside the xylem, that resemble colonies of rhizobial bacterioids.

It is not known whether the non-nodulating nitrogen fixation, if it exists, benefits neighboring plants as is said to be the case with nodulating legumes.

In research using databases, more than 60 phytochemicals were identified from honey locust, including polyphenols, triterpenes, sterols, and saponins, with in vitro studies assessing for possible biological activity.