The Homework Helper: Fruity Proverbs

No matter what you call them – adages, aphorisms, banalities, bromides, bywords, clichés, inanities, maxims, mottos, platitudes, proverbs, proverbial sayings, saws, sayings, truisms, wise words – sometimes we all need a simple way to express an observation or a principle generally accepted as wise or true. Here’s a list of proverbs related to fruit that I’ve gathered together. Who says homework and research can't be fun!

1. A fruit tree that grows in a dung heap will certainly blossom.

2. A good tree bears good fruit.

3. A lawsuit is a fruit-tree planted in a lawyer's garden.

4. A palm tree growing in the shade will not bear ripe fruit.

5. A woman's belly is a garden with many kinds of fruit.

6. All birds will flock to a fruitful tree.

7. All the fruit is not found in just one field.

8. An ass does not appreciate fruit compote.

9. Away from home the girl picks forbidden fruit.

10. Big trees cast more shadow than fruit.

11. Bitter fruit will fall before the ripe.

12. Deeds are fruits, words are only leaves.

13. Elm trees have beautiful branches but hardly ever bear fruit.

14. Forbidden fruit is sweet.

15. He who would enjoy the fruit must not spoil the blossoms.

16. In a tree that you can't climb, there are always a thousand fruits.

17. Looking at a tree see its fruit; looking at a man see his deeds.

18. Love is often the fruit of marriage.

19. Many flowers, few fruits.

20. Men will only throw stones at trees that are laden with fruit.

21. Not all the tree's blossoms will bear fruit.

22. Patience is bitter but its fruits are sweet.

23. Ripe fruit falls by itself, but it does not fall into your mouth.

24. The better the fruit, the more wasps to eat it.

25. The branch bearing the most fruit bends itself thankfully towards the ground.

26. The children eat the fruit and the father sleeps on the peel.

27. The fire is winter's fruit.

28. The fruit of silence is tranquillity.

29. The hanging fruit is never too heavy for the creeper to bear.

30. The oldest trees bear the softest fruits.

31. The tree of silence bears the fruit of peace.

32. The tree of silence bears the fruits of peace.

33. The trees with most leaves will not necessarily produce juicy fruit.\

34. Vanity blossoms but bears no fruit.

35. We will be grateful to flowers only if they have born fruits.

36. What you give to others bears fruit for yourself.

37. When eating the fruit, think of the person who planted the tree.

38. You don't have to cut a tree down to get at the fruit.

39. You shake in vain the branch that bears no fruit.

40. Gather the breadfruit from the farthest branches first.

41. A stone from the hand of a friend is an apple.

42. Adam ate the apple and out teeth still ache.

43. An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

44. An apple never falls far from the tree.

45. An apple-pie without some cheese is like a kiss without a squeeze.

46. Apple blossoms are beautiful, but rice dumplings are better.

47. Better an apple pie than apple blossom.

48. No apple tree is immune from worms.

49. One of the two partners always bites the best part of the apple.

50. One of the two partners always bites the best part of the apple.

51. One rotten apple spoils the whole barrel.

52. Only the knife knows the heart of a pineapple.

53. When the apple is ripe it will fall.

54. You can count the apples on a tree, but you can count the trees from one apple.

55. If an ox doesn't know the size of his arse he won't eat an apricot stone.

56. A grape that sees another gets ripe.

57. Beautiful grapes often make poor wine.

58. Grapes do not grow in a willow tree.

59. Grapes picked too early don't even make good vinegar.

60. Some men will build a wine cellar when they have found just one grape.

61. Give your friend a pig and your enemy a peach.

62. Receive a plum, return a peach.

63. Don't call me a little olive until you've picked me.

64. Better a handful of dry dates and content therewith than to own the Gate of Peacocks and be kicked in the eye by a broody camel.

65. Don't show me the palm tree, show me the dates.

66. If heaven drops a date, open your mouth.

67. Mock the palm tree only when the date harvest is over.

68. A coconut shell full of water is a sea to an ant.

69. A fly does not mind dying in coconut cream.

70. Eat coconuts while you have teeth.

71. He on whose head we would break a coconut never stands still.

72. If you had teeth of steel, you could eat iron coconuts.

73. It is the fate of the coconut husk to float, for the stone to sink.

74. Only the man who is not hungry says the coconut has a hard shell.

75. A strawberry blossom will not moisten dry bread.

76. Every raisin contains a pip.

77. Dogs don't like bananas, but can't bear to think chickens eat them.

78. Little by little grow the bananas.

79. Lower your head modestly while passing, and you will harvest bananas.

80. Man is like a banana: when he leaves the bunch, he gets skinned.

81. No sane person sharpens his machete to cut a banana tree.

82. When the monkey can't reach the ripe banana, he says it is not sweet.

83. A black plum is as sweet as a white.

84. If heaven above lets fall a plum, open your mouth.

85. Receive a plum, return a peach.

86. One armpit cannot hold two watermelons.

87. The pumpkin vine never bears watermelons.

88. Two watermelons cannot be held in one hand.

89. Two watermelons cannot be held under one arm.

90. A woman and a melon are hard to choose.

91. Avoid suspicion: when walking through your neighbor's melon patch, don't tie your shoe.

92. Marriage is a little bit like buying melons, you need a little luck.

93. No melon peddler cries, "Bitter melons." No wine dealer says, "Sour wine.”

94. One gives a melon, the other gets the stomach cramps.

95. An orange never bears a lime.

96. It is the softness of the lime that is fatal to the bird.

97. Only when you have eaten a lemon do you appreciate what sugar is.

98. When life throws you lemons, make lemonade.

99. He ate one fig and he thought the autumn had come.

100. If you have figs in your knapsack, everyone will want to be your friend.

101. One eats figs whilst the other pays.

102. Sharing figs can leave you with none at all.

103. When the figs are ripe all the birds want to eat.

104. A dead cherry tree will not blossom.

105. He who eats cherries with gentlemen risks getting the pips in his nose.

106. He who likes cherries soon learns to climb.

107. Life is just a bowl of cherries.

108. Money buys cherries.

109. Neither give cherries to pigs nor advice to fools.

110. The most beautiful figs may contain a worms.

111. A pear will never fall into a closed mouth.

112. A ripe pear is more likely to fall in the shit than onto the clean ground.

If you have additional proverbs or sayings about fruit that you’d like to share, please email them to me and I’ll add them to the list!