I. ˈkräp noun
( -s )
Etymology: Middle English, from Old English cropp craw, cluster, head of a plant; akin to Old High German kropf goiter, craw, Old Norse kroppr torso, body, Old English crēopan to creep — more at creep
1.
a. now Scotland : the top, head, or highest part originally of an herb, flower, or tree
b. : finial
c. : the upper part of a whip : the stock or handle of a whip ; specifically : a riding whip with a short straight stock and a loop
d. : outcrop
2.
a. : an enlargement of the gullet of many birds that forms a pouch which serves as a receptacle for the food and for its preliminary maceration
b. dialect , of a human : stomach ; also : throat
c. : an enlargement of the gullet of some animals (as insects)
3. : something that has been cut or trimmed or that is the result of cutting and trimming: as
a. : the part of the chine of a quadruped (as a domestic cow) lying immediately behind the withers — usually used in plural; see cow illustration
b. dialect : a cut of meat from this region : short ribs or spareribs
c. : the portion of tanned hide resulting from cutting in half along backbone and then trimming off the belly
4.
a. : an earmark on an animal ; especially : one made by a straight cut squarely removing the upper part of the ear
b.
[ crop (II) ]
: a close cut of the hair ; also : a style of wearing the hair cut short
5. : the end or ends of an ingot, billet, slab, bar, or other semifinished metallic mill product cut off and discarded because of defects
6.
a.
(1) : a plant or animal or plant or animal product that can be grown and harvested extensively for profit or subsistence
an apple crop
a maple-sugar crop
a crop of foals
(2) in turpentine orcharding : the working unit generally equal to 10,000 boxes and usually coming from a tract of timber of some 250 acres comprising about 5000 trees
b. : the product or yield of anything formed together
a crop of garnets
the ice crop
c. : a batch or lot (as of something produced during a particular cycle) : collection
a crop of lies
a crop of war babies
it was there the more unscrupulous whaling captains got their bumper crop of hands — H.A.Chippendale
a bumper crop of best stories — Bennett Cerf
7. : the total yearly production from a specified area
the local grange reported that the county corn crop had never been better
II. verb
( cropped ; cropped ; cropping ; crops )
Etymology: Middle English croppen, from crop, n. (top)
transitive verb
1.
a. : to cut off (as the top or upper or outer parts of a tree or plant) : lop off
crop branches
specifically : to trim especially by the cutting off of grass, leaves, buds, or twigs
crop a hedge
cropped lawns
b.
(1) : to clip off the tops of (the ears) as a means of identifying animals or formerly as a punishment for criminals
(2) : to trim (the wattles of a bird) — compare dub
c. : to shear (cloth)
d. : to cut (the hair) close
these Indians cropped their hair above the eyebrows and along the nape of the neck — Alfred Métraux & Curt Nimuendajú
e.
(1) : to trim (as a book) too close to the printed matter
(2) : to cut off or mask out unwanted parts of (as a photograph that is to be engraved or an overlarge halftone cut)
(3) : to trim down arbitrarily : excise to suit one's purposes
he relied on cropped passages from the Old Testament — Time
2.
a. now dialect Britain : to gather (as flowers) : pluck
b. : to gather by or as if by cutting : reap , harvest
a continuous cropping of forest lands — E.S.Mason
the number of trout cropped each year
3. : to feed or graze on especially by biting off the tenderer shoots : browse
sheep cropping a meadow
4.
a. : to cause (land) to bear produce : plant , cultivate
after the land has been cropped for about three years it is allowed to revert to bush — Madeline Manoukian
b. : to grow as a crop
potatoes are cropped in the valley
intransitive verb
1. : to feed on grass : graze
it was so quiet that I could hear the sheep cropping — Mary Webb
2.
a. : to yield a crop
the berry bushes were in their first season but cropped well
b. : farm , cultivate
he crops far more heavily than in the North — McGill News
specifically : to farm as a sharecropper
I tried to get hold of Tom … and found he was cropping at a Mr. Bannerman's — Caroline Gordon
3.
a. : to appear at the surface : outcrop
the rocks which crop out on the Allegheny plateau — Journal of Geology
b. : to turn up or appear unexpectedly or casually
problems kept cropping up
the naïveté that crops out in his work