Pickaxe the tool. A pickaxe handle (sometimes called a "pickhandle" or "pick helve") without the head is sometimes used, often unofficially, as a baton: for example it is officially sometimes used as a baton in the British Army. In "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck, pick handles featured prominently as a weapon used against the migrant farmers. A normal pickaxe handle is made of ash or hickory wood and is about three feet long and weighs about 2.5 pounds. British Army pickaxe handles must, by regulation, be exactly three feet long, for use in measuring in the field. New variant
Balanites rotundifolia The wood is used as firewood and to make charcoal. It is fashioned into poles, tool handles, carvings, utensils (e.g. head rests, wooden spoons and combs). The leaves and shoots provide fodder for domestic animals in very arid areas. It is used for live fencing and the cut branches are used to make fences, it is also planted in soil conservation projects. There are no known medicinal applications. Balanites rotundifolia Balanites rotundifolia, known in Swahili as Mbamba ngoma is a spiny bush or small tree from eastern Africa and southern Arabia. It is a member of the caltrop family, Zygophyllaceae.