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conifer

UK/ˈkɒnɪfə(ɹ)/US/ˈkɒnɪfə(ɹ)/
nounB2Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechmostly written

Other forms: conifers

A conifer is a tree that bears cones and keeps its needles. A stand of conifers.

Needles lose far less water than leaves, which is why a conifer survives cold and poor ground. The conifers were the dominant trees long before any flowering plant existed.

Sapin88 · CC BY-SA 3.0

Definitions of conifer

  1. 1nounconiferA tree that bears cones and keeps its needles.B2

    “Nothing grows under a conifer plantation.”

conifer is a tree.

Where it comes from

Latin conifer, cone-bearing, from conus and ferre, to carry.

  1. Latin

    cōnifer — bearing cones

  2. English, today

    conifer

From Latin cōnifer (“bearing cones”), by surface analysis, cōnus + -fer.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Dinosaurs & Prehistory

Practise this word

conifer in the wild

  • All extant conifers, except for the gnetophytes, are perennials with secondary growth.

    Conifer

  • Many conifers today are relict species, surviving in a small part of their former ranges.

    Conifer

  • There are small, temperate conifer forests in New Zealand.

    Temperate coniferous forest

  • A cone, or in formal botanical usage a strobilus, pl.: strobili, is a seed-bearing organ on gymnosperm plants, especially in conifers and cycads.

    Cone (botany)

  • The cones of Pinophyta (conifer clade) contain the reproductive structures.

    Cone (botany)

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.