crop

To remove the top end of something, especially a plant.

Noun

  1. A plant, grown for it, or its fruits or seeds, to be harvested as food, livestock fodder, or fuel or for any other economic purpose.
    • The farmer had to decide which crop to grow as his main bet for the coming year. Would it be barley, oats, or something else?
  2. The production amount of such an output for a specific season or year, particularly of plants.
    • It was a good crop of oats this year. What a nice change after last year's crop!

    Synonyms: harvest yield

  3. A group, cluster, or collection of things occurring at the same time.
    • The decade produced a whole crop of ideas about space travel.
    • The university had an exceptional crop of graduates in 1892, including three who went on to win Nobel Prizes.
    • And even if Anna Wintour wanted to invite a fresh crop of internet talent, who would she choose? Can you name anyone in the past year who has ascended in a major way? - 2024 June 26, Stephanie McNeal, “Influencers...
  4. A group of vesicles at the same stage of development in a disease.
    • The patient had a crop of bumps indicative of chicken pox.
  5. The lashing end of a whip.
  6. An entire short whip, especially as used in horse-riding.

    Synonyms: hunting crop riding crop whip bat

  7. A rocky outcrop.
  8. The act of cropping.
  9. A photograph or other image that has been reduced by removing the outer parts.
    • This indicates to the engraver that the subject may be cropped to yield the size desired, but it is advisable that the position for the crop also be determined and marked, else some essential feature of the copy may be...
  10. A short haircut.
    • She went from a ponytail to a crop.
    • Eton crop
    • From an inner pocket he produces a costly Ramillies Wig, shakes it out in a brisk Cloud of scented Litharge, and claps it on, with a minimum of fuss, over his ascetic’s Crop. - 1997, Thomas Pynchon, Mason & Dixon, 1st...
  11. A pouch-like part of the alimentary tract of some birds (and some other animals), used to store food before digestion or for regurgitation.
    • A little bird sat on the edge of her nest; Her yellow-beaks slept as sound as tops; That day she had done her very best, And had filled every one of their little crops. - 1871, George MacDonald, “The Early Bird”, in At...
    • The bird gave a gulp, and I felt the stone pass along its gullet and down into its crop. - 1892 [January], A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. VII.—The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.”, in Geo[rge]...
    • As the wildebeest shrinks, the circle of sated birds lounging in the short grass expands. With bulging crops, the vultures settle their heads atop folded wings and slide their nictitating membranes shut. - 2015...

    Synonyms: craw

    Coordinate Terms: gizzard

  12. The foliate part of a finial.

Origin

From Middle English crop, croppe, from Old English cropp, croppa (“the head or top of a plant, a sprout or herb, a bunch or cluster of flowers, an ear of corn, the craw of a bird, a kidney”), from Proto-West Germanic *kropp, from Proto-Germanic *kruppaz (“body, trunk, crop”), from Proto-Indo-European *grewb- (“to warp, bend, crawl”). Cognates Cognate with Dutch krop (“crop”), German Low German Kropp (“a swelling on the neck, the craw, maw”), German Kropf (“the craw, ear of grain, head of lettuce or cabbage”), Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish kropp (“body, trunk”), Faroese and Icelandic kroppur (“body”). Related to crap. Doublet of group and croup.

Forms

crops

Hyponyms

alley crop bumper crop cash crop catch crop county crop cover crop fallow crop food crop green crop money crop row crop sharecrop smother crop specialty crop standing crop stonecrop sunset crop trap crop truck crop white crop

Derived

aftercrop alley crop anticrop bumper crop cash crop catch crop cover crop cream of the crop cream the crop cropbound crop circle crop-dust cropduster crop-dusting crop dusting crop-ear cropful cropfull cropland croplands cropless croplike cropmark crop mark

Verb

  1. To remove the top end of something, especially a plant.
    • I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender one. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Ezekiel 17:22:
  2. To mow, reap or gather.
  3. To cut (especially hair or an animal's tail or ears) short.
    • And the knave who refuses to drink till he fall, / Why the hangman shall crop him — ears, love-locks, and all. - 1890, George John Whyte-Melville, Holmby House: A Tale of Old Northamptonshire, page 92:
  4. To remove the outer parts of a photograph or other image, typically in order to frame the subject better.
    • Reduce to six inches wide and crop to eight inches high. - 1924, Harry Appleton Groesbeck Jr., “Preparation of Copy”, in The Process and Practice of Photo-engraving, Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page & Company,...
    • You'll see that when you enlarge a subject to many times its normal size, and then crop the photo so there is nothing in proportion to be recognized, all resemblance to the original can be hidden. - 1944 July, “WHAT...
    • Crop the photo for emphasis and composition. - 1964, Proctor P. Taylor Jr., “Photographs”, in Preparing Contractor Reports for NASA: Technical Illustrating (NASA Special Publications; 7008), 2nd edition, Scientific and...
  5. To yield harvest.
  6. To cause to bear a crop.
    • to crop a field
  7. To beat with a crop, or riding-whip.
    • She cropped the horse into a comfortable canter and enjoyed the familiar rhythm and bounce of the horse's stride. - 2013, Mary Hart Perry, Seducing the Princess:

Origin

From Middle English croppen (“to cut, pluck and eat”), from Old English *croppian. Cognate with Scots crap (“to crop”), Dutch kroppen (“to cram, digest”), Low German kröppen (“to cut, crop, stuff the craw”), German kröpfen (“to crop”), Icelandic kroppa (“to cut, crop, pick”). Literally, to take off the crop (top, head, ear) of a plant. See Etymology 1.

Forms

crops cropping cropped

Derived

crop-ear crop out croppable crop up miscrop outcrop overcrop recrop uncrop