culling
Americannoun
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the act or process of selecting and removing desirable or undesirable individuals from a group.
Reducing farm exposure to the bacteria will require more rigorous testing and culling of infected animals.
-
the process of gathering or collecting.
To realize progress through the transfer of ideas, an informed culling of content and the extension of a shared knowledge base are essential.
-
the group of things resulting from either of these processes.
The collection War in Context provides a crucial culling of stories that I would surely have missed had I not read it.
Etymology
Origin of culling
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The bird flu outbreak is ongoing and has led to the culling of millions of birds, mostly turkeys, over the past few months.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 17, 2026
“ET” has long been culling the archives for the career retrospectives that air on weekends under the title “ET Vault Unlocked,” which are also available on demand through YouTube.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 23, 2026
In 2020, it ordered the culling of all roughly 17 million farm-raised mink in Denmark to stop the spread of a coronavirus mutation, a directive it later admitted had no legal grounds.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 19, 2026
By culling the bears -- which can weigh up to half a ton and outrun a human -- officials hope to stem the threat across parts of northern Japan.
From Barron's • Dec. 24, 2025
A live oyster, a good one, when it hits the culling board has a tightly closed shell.
From "Jacob Have I Loved" by Katherine Paterson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
