caducous

American  

[kuh-doo-kuhs, -dyoo-] / kəˈdu kəs, -ˈdyu- /

adjective

1. Botany. dropping off very early, as leaves.

2. Zoology. subject to shedding.

3. transitory; perishable.

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caducous British  

/ kəˈdjuːkəs /

adjective

1. biology (of parts of a plant or animal) shed during the life of the organism

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caducous Scientific  

/ kə-do̅o̅′kəs /

1. Detaching or dropping off at an early stage of development. The gills of most amphibians and the sepals or stipules of certain plants are caducous.

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Etymology

Origin of caducous

First recorded in 1675–85 for obsolete sense; 1805–10 for current senses; from Latin cadūcus “unsteady, perishable,” equivalent to cad(ere) “to fall” + -ūcus adjective suffix ( see -ous)

Example Sentences

They invariably come laden with words that seem meant to prove his vocabulary is bigger than yours: flocculent, crapulent, caducous, anaglypta, mephitic, velutinous.

From New York Times • Oct. 1, 2020

Sepals 3–5, usually 4, concave, petal-like, very caducous.

From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa

Embryo recurved.—Trees with milky juice, alternate entire pinnately veined leaves, caducous stipules, axillary peduncles, and stout axillary spines.

From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa

Flowers yellow, in racemes, with caducous bracts and bractlets.

From The Medicinal Plants of the Philippines by Thomas, Jerome Beers

The first and the second glumes are unequal, persistent or separately caducous.

From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.