Crossword clues for cull
cull
- Select the best
- Gather discriminately
- Carefully select and gather
- Sift through
- Separate out
- Select with care
- Put aside the inferior ones
- Look for and gather
- Separate, as the wheat from the chaff
- Separate the best from the rest
- Selectively remove
- Select and gather
- Remove the weak
- Pluck pickily
- Pick out from others
- Gather — slaughter
- Extract with care
- Choose what's choice
- Choose from a group
- Choose for downsizing
- Bruised peach, to an orchardist
- Select from a group
- Pick out with care
- Get the best of
- Choose the best of
- Gather selectively
- The person or thing rejected or set aside as inferior in quality
- Choose what is choice
- Weed out
- Gather carefully
- Garner
- Choose carefully
- Select carefully
- Obtain from a variety of sources
- Selectively slaughter
- Reduce the population by selective slaughter
- Thin out, as a herd
- Pick and choose
- Pick over
- Selectively eliminate
- Pick through
- Pick the pick of the litter, e.g
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Cull \Cull\, n. A cully; a dupe; a gull. See Cully.
Cull \Cull\ (k?l), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Culled (k?ld); p. pr. & vb. n. Culling.] [OE.cullen, OF. cuillir, coillir, F.cueillir, to gather, pluck, pick, fr. L. colligere. See Coil, v. t., and cf. Collect.] To separate, select, or pick out; to choose and gather or collect; as, to cull flowers.
From his herd he culls,
For slaughter, from the fairest of his bulls.
--Dryden.
Whitest honey in fairy gardens culled.
--Tennyson.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
early 14c., "choose, select, pick; collect and gather the best things from a number or quantity," especially with reference to literary selections, from Old French cuiler "collect, gather, pluck, select" (12c., Modern French cueillir), from Latin colligere "gather together, collect," originally "choose, select" (see collect). Meaning "select livestock according to quality" is from 1889; notion of "select and kill (animals)," usually in the name of reducing overpopulation or improving the stock, is from 1934. Related: Culled; culling.
"dupe, saphead," rogues' slang from late 16c., perhaps a shortening of cullion "base fellow," originally "testicle" (from French couillon, from Old French coillon "testicle; worthless fellow, dolt," from Latin coleus, literally "strainer bag;" see cojones), though another theory traces it to Romany (Gypsy) chulai "man." Also sometimes in the form cully, however some authorities assert cully was the canting term for "dupe" and cull was generic "man, fellow," without implication of gullibility. Compare also gullible.
1610s, "a selection," from cull (v.). From 1791 as "flock animal selected as inferior;" 1958 as "a killing of animals deemed inferior."
Wiktionary
Etymology 1 n. 1 A selection. 2 An organised killing of selected animals. vb. 1 To pick or take someone or something (from a larger group). 2 To gather, collect. 3 To select animals from a group and then kill them in order to reduce the numbers of the group in a controlled manner. 4 (context nonstandard euphemistic English) To kill (animals etc). 5 To lay off in order to reduce the size of, get rid of. Etymology 2
n. (context slang dialectal English) A fool, gullible person; a dupe.
WordNet
n. the person or thing rejected or set aside as inferior in quality [syn: reject]
Wikipedia
Cull is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
- Elizabeth Cull (21st century), Canadian politician, teacher, and broadcast panel member
- Nicholas J. Cull (21st century), British writer
- John Cull, Australian politician
- David "Dave" Cull, Mayor of Dunedin, New Zealand
Usage examples of "cull".
The twins Cull and Arlec Byce crossed their matching limewood axes on top of the growing pile.
I was to be culled, for no more reason than to keep the Academy in political balance.
I was naked at the carnival and everyone knew that I had been culled from the Academy.
To speak of us being culled seemed unlucky, as if it were a curse I might bring down on us by speaking it aloud.
I could not even tell them of my dishonourable discharge or that they were soon to be culled as well.
Dark Evening and Caulder, and being culled with only a future as a scout now.
He has already heard rumours that Rebin will recall many of the culled cadets from previous years, to try to rebuild a corps of officers for the future.
I could not even tell them of my dishonorable discharge or that they were soon to be culled as well.
He has already heard rumors that Rebin will recall many of the culled cadets from previous years, to try to rebuild a corps of officers for the future.
I have never been outside the United States, and so my curiosity about the rest of the world has gone untended, save for information culled from periodicals and the people around me.
She culled out any that dealt with photography or imaging, and focused on a more workable list of nine.
After watching the horse long enough to see his mistake, Tolleston culled the gray back and rode into the herd to claim another.
There were now over a hundred and forty head to be culled back, and Sponsilier was entitled to ten of them.
The seller agreed to hold them overnight, and Flood and I culled back about one hundred and twenty which were under age or too light.
After Flood rode out of this second contingent, I culled back about a dozen light weights.