pruning
Americannoun
-
the act or practice of cutting or lopping off undesired twigs, branches, or roots.
Some pruning of your tea roses during the summer is useful to encourage growth and flowers.
-
the act or practice of getting rid of undesirable elements or excess.
You can do this pruning of emails for an hour a day till you're down to an empty inbox.
Etymology
Origin of pruning
First recorded in 1540–50; prun(e) 2 ( def. ) + -ing 1 ( def. )
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.
Instead the final four candidates for the job were a range of eager submissives, each straining to appear enthusiastic to pick up the pruning shears and start cutting rates by the bunch:
Recent studies have increasingly tied the complement cascade to excessive synaptic pruning and to neurological disorders.
From Science Daily
This idea led to the widely accepted theory that excessive "synaptic pruning," the process of removing weak or unused connections, could contribute to neuropsychiatric conditions.
From Science Daily
Companies are pruning underperforming legacy brands and doubling down on faster-growing categories.
From Barron's
Unilever said on Monday that it will focus on producing condiments and other packaged products to "sharpen" its catalogue of goods, which will mean "pruning the portfolio where relevant".
From BBC
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.
