pruning
Americannoun
-
the act or practice of cutting or lopping off undesired twigs, branches, or roots.
Some pruning of your tea roses during the summer is useful to encourage growth and flowers.
-
the act or practice of getting rid of undesirable elements or excess.
You can do this pruning of emails for an hour a day till you're down to an empty inbox.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of pruning
First recorded in 1540–50; prun(e) 2 ( def. ) + -ing 1 ( def. )
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.
Brazilian director Karim Ainouz's surreal satire "Rosebush Pruning" premiered on Saturday at the Berlin Film Festival with one of the programme's starriest casts portraying an outrageously spoiled and dysfunctional family descending into chaos.
From Barron's • Feb. 14, 2026
Pruning allows both air and sunlight to move freely between the vines.
From BBC • Sep. 17, 2024
Pruning, thinning and harvesting peaches must be done within a very tight time frame, Karm Bains said.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 29, 2022
Pruning tomato plants late in the season should be more aggressive than early-season pruning: your aim is to improve airflow and let more sunlight in.
From Salon • Jul. 7, 2022
Pruning, where given, is defective and so is the method of gathering the leaves.
From Notes on Agriculture in Cyprus and Its Products by Bevan, William
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.
