fructification

American  

[fruhk-tuh-fi-key-shuhn, frook-, frook-] / ˌfrʌk tə fɪˈkeɪ ʃən, ˌfrʊk-, ˌfruk- /

noun

1. act of fructifying; the fruiting of a plant, fungus, etc.

2. the fruit itself.

3. the organs of fruiting; fruiting body.

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fructification British  

/ ˌfrʊk-, ˌfrʌktɪfɪˈkeɪʃən /

noun

1. the act or state of fructifying

2. the fruit of a seed-bearing plant

3. any spore-bearing structure in ferns, mosses, fungi, etc

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fructification Scientific  

/ frŭk′tə-fĭ-kā′shən /

1. The producing of fruit by an angiosperm.

2. A seed-bearing or spore-bearing structure.

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Etymology

Origin of fructification

1605–15; < Late Latin frūctificātion- (stem of frūctificātiō ) a bearing of fruit, equivalent to Latin frūctificāt ( us ) (past participle of frūctificāre; fructify ) + -iōn- -ion

Explanation

Fructification is the process of growing fruit. During fructification, a pear tree will first grow fragrant blossoms before they develop into delicious pears. When a plant undergoes fructification, you can also say it fructifies, or develops so that it can produce fruit. Both words stem from the Latin fructificare, "bear fruit," and its root fructus, which means both "fruit" and "profit or enjoyment." You can use fructification in this figurative way too, to mean "make productive." You might say, "The fructification of my lemonade stand means I can pay you back for all that sugar I borrowed!"

Example Sentences

The fructification forms in the substance of the tips of the frond: the rough dots mark the places where the conceptacles open.

From The Elements of Botany For Beginners and For Schools by Gray, Asa

Most numerous was Gigartina radula, just in a state of fructification.

From Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate Novara, Volume I (Commodore B. Von Wullerstorf-Urbair,) Undertaken by Order of the Imperial Government in the Years 1857, 1858, & 1859, Under the Immediate Auspices of His I. and R. Highness the Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, Commander-In-Chief of the Austrian Navy. by Scherzer, Karl Ritter von

Asperococcus derives its name from its roughened surface, occasioned by the thickly scattered spots of fructification.

From Sea-Weeds, Shells and Fossils by Gray, Peter

Verlaine, however, was not of Alsatian extraction but belonged to Lorraine, close enough to Germany to bear in his blood the secret fructification of the German Lied.

From Paul Verlaine by Zweig, Stefan

The chill which poverty breathes over the mind is as unfriendly to the unfolding of the intellectual germs, as the icy atmosphere of winter is to the fructification of vegetable seed.

From Monks, Popes, and their Political Intrigues by Alberger, John

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