mistletoe
a European plant, Viscum album, having yellowish flowers and white berries, growing parasitically on various trees, used in Christmas decorations.
any of several other related, similar plants, as Phoradendron serotinum, of the U.S.: the state flower of Oklahoma.
Origin of mistletoe
1Words Nearby mistletoe
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use mistletoe in a sentence
Christmas trees bought and decorated, fireplace mantels being decorated and holly and mistletoe hung.
Christmas for the LGBTQ community and friends | Peter Rosenstein | December 9, 2021 | Washington BladeIn fact, “mistletoe might teach us a lesson on how to survive at energy-limiting conditions,” Senkler said.
“We started joking about researchers falling off trees in the attempt to get their hands on mistletoe plants,” Senkler wrote in an email to Quanta.
Holiday-season traditions stretching back for centuries have linked wintertime romance to decorative sprigs of mistletoe.
Eventually, the mistletoe bush grows, blooms, and forms berries, and the cycle begins anew.
In a dramatic twist on mistletoe reproduction, their seeds explode, literally.
“mistletoe infections can be a symptom of larger problems,” notes Shaw.
mistletoe is basically a vampire—but one of those an anti-hero type vampires.
Mistletoes infections can kill individual trees and stands of trees, and most mistletoe species attack specific tree species.
Fieldfares and mistletoe Thrushes usually sell at fourpence each, the rest at fourpence a couple.
Birds of Guernsey (1879) | Cecil SmithAnd he said, in a very low voice, 'I didn't dare to kiss you under the mistletoe.'
Four Days | Hetty HemenwayThe mistletoe was a sore puzzle to our ancestors, almost as great a mystery as the Fern.
The plant-lore and garden-craft of Shakespeare | Henry Nicholson EllacombeThe mystery attaching to the mistletoe arose from the ignorance as to its production.
The plant-lore and garden-craft of Shakespeare | Henry Nicholson EllacombeIn my dreams last night were all sorts of Christmas things—home and mistletoe and you under it, my love.
Polly the Pagan | Isabel Anderson
British Dictionary definitions for mistletoe
/ (ˈmɪsəlˌtəʊ) /
a Eurasian evergreen shrub, Viscum album, with leathery leaves, yellowish flowers, and waxy white berries: grows as a partial parasite on various trees: used as a Christmas decoration: family Viscaceae
any of several similar and related American plants in the families Loranthaceae or Viscaceae, esp Phoradendron flavescens
mistletoe cactus an epiphytic cactus, Rhipsalis cassytha, that grows in tropical America
Origin of mistletoe
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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