crop
Forms
- Plural
- crops
- present (v1)
- crop
- past (v2)
- cropped
- past participle (v3)
- cropped
- present participle
- cropping
- 3rd person singular
- crops
Definitions
1.A plant, grown for it, or its fruits or seeds, to be harvested as food, livestock fodder, or fuel or for any other economic purpose.
- The farmer had to decide which crop to grow as his main bet for the coming year. Would it be barley, oats, or something else?
2.The production amount of such an output for a specific season or year, particularly of plants.
- It was a good crop of oats this year. What a nice change after last year's crop!
3.A group, cluster, or collection of things occurring at the same time.
- The decade produced a whole crop of ideas about space travel.
- The university had an exceptional crop of graduates in 1892, including three who went on to win Nobel Prizes.
- And even if Anna Wintour wanted to invite a fresh crop of internet talent, who would she choose? Can you name anyone in the past year who has ascended in a major way?
4.A group of vesicles at the same stage of development in a disease.
- The patient had a crop of bumps indicative of chicken pox.
1.To remove the top end of something, especially a plant.
- I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender one.
2.To mow, reap or gather.
3.To cut (especially hair or an animal's tail or ears) short.
- And the knave who refuses to drink till he fall, / Why the hangman shall crop him, ears, love-locks, and all.
4.To remove the outer parts of a photograph or other image, typically in order to frame the subject better.
- Crop the photo for emphasis and composition.
- Reduce to six inches wide and crop to eight inches high.
- You'll see that when you enlarge a subject to many times its normal size, and then crop the photo so there is nothing in proportion to be recognized, all resemblance to the original can be hidden.
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #2835
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Etymology
From Middle English crop, croppe, from Old English cropp, croppa (“the head or top of a plant, a sprout or herb, a bunch or cluster of flowers, an ear of corn, the craw of a bird, a kidney”), from Proto-West Germanic *kropp, from Proto-Germanic *kruppaz (“body, trunk, crop”), from Proto-Indo-European *grewb- (“to warp, bend, crawl”).