scrubby
Americanadjective
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low or stunted, as trees.
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consisting of or covered with scrub, stunted trees, etc.
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undersized or inferior, as animals.
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wretched; shabby.
adjective
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covered with or consisting of scrub
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(of trees or vegetation) stunted in growth
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informal messy
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of scrubby
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.
Kharg Island, targeted in US air strikes on Saturday, is a scrubby stretch of land in the Gulf that handles almost all of Iran's crude exports.
From Barron's • Mar. 14, 2026
Should I use precious column inches teasing out the scrubby understeer of a Toyota Sienna minivan?
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 6, 2025
She says she had been stuck in France for two months, after travelling there from Vietnam via Hungary, sleeping in tents in a scrubby forest.
From BBC • Jan. 5, 2025
Setting fires in the Sandhills of central North Carolina requires an understanding of moisture levels in the scrubby underbrush, and she gets a better sense of it in bare feet.
From Salon • Oct. 20, 2024
Fred followed the humans out the back door and into a narrow fenced-in patch of dirt and scrubby grass.
From "Dog Squad" by Chris Grabenstein
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.
