red bird's eye

9.9

A small European wildflower with red or pink flowers

noun

: ojo de pájaro rojo

The wildflower garden featured a group of red bird's eye blooming by the fence.

Examples

Gardeners often plant red bird's eye for its striking pink blossoms.
I identified a red bird's eye while hiking in the European countryside.
Look at that red bird's eye!
I saw a beautiful red bird's eye in the garden.
Gardeners often plant red bird's eye for its striking pink blossoms.
The wildflower garden featured a group of red bird's eye blooming by the fence.
I identified a red bird's eye while hiking in the European countryside.

Synonyms

red campion

vsred bird's eye

7.6

A wild plant with bright pink or red flowers that grows in fields and woods

is the botanical biennial placed in the catchfly family by some classifiers

Lychnis dioica

vsred bird's eye

Specialized

9.9

A European plant that lives two years and has bright pink or red flowers that attract bees

is treated as a catchfly family plant rather than the specific Caryophyllaceae label

Silene dioica

vsred bird's eye

Specialized

9.9

A wild plant with red or pink flowers that grows near woods and hedges

is given as a strictly biennial catchfly family plant rather than perennial

Surface Forms

red bird's eye singular

red bird's eyes plural

Morphology

red + bird's + eye

The components 'red' and the descriptive compound 'bird's-eye' give a visible clue (something red with an eye-like marking), so a learner could guess a red object with an eye-like feature. However, the expression is a conventionalized name for a particular plant species, and knowing the constituents does not reliably signal that the referent is a biennial plant in the catchfly family. The lexicalized taxonomic meaning therefore makes the item only partially predictable to a B1 learner.

Etymology

Red bird's eye comes from how the flower looks: its small round centre is bright red and looks like a tiny bird's eye. That's why people call the 'plant' by that name.