freshet
Americannoun
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a freshwater stream flowing into the sea.
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a sudden rise in the level of a stream, or a flood, caused by heavy rains or the rapid melting of snow and ice.
noun
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the sudden overflowing of a river caused by heavy rain or melting snow
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a stream of fresh water emptying into the sea
Synonym Usage
See flood.
Etymology
Origin of freshet
Vocabulary lists containing freshet
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.
However, spring spill would be boosted, to help spring Chinook by providing something more like a spring freshet for young fish migrating to the sea.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 14, 2023
“The play itself is a freshet of good will, a celebration of the indomitability of man, a call to return to the earth,” the critic Mel Gussow wrote in the Times in 1979.
From New York Times ● Mar. 21, 2023
Elms, highest in the floodplain, drop seeds first because that’s where the spring freshet first recedes, then silver maples, then cottonwoods, then willows, each feeding different bird species as they arrive.
From Slate ● Oct. 14, 2019
Its tiny seeds will float atop the current of a spring freshet, and, waterborne to a sandy beach, sprout within 24 hours of hitting even the barest cobble.
From Seattle Times ● May 21, 2018
Resolve had begun to flow into him, at first like a freshet, then like a river.
From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
