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Glite Dictionary
to sow in

to sow in

1 3.4
To put seeds in the ground so they can grow
  • phrasal verb
  • /soʊ ɪn/
translation icon : sembrar
  • It is like a mustard seed... which a man took and sowed in his field.
  • seeds can be sown in

Examples

  • The seeds I have sown in the last week or so are starting to emerge through the soil.

    Blog text (31)

  • Gardeners in the area prefer to sow beans in rich soil for a better yield.

  • Oh, and the Swedes I sow in early June, plant late June.

  • My dad worked on the land; he would sow corn and rice in rented lands.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • I'd sow them in the harrowed fields of Islip and Pamplona.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • When the tobacco harvest was over and they separated to work alone or in pairs again on their own farms, he would sow the bare ground in wheat.

    Fiction book (1997)

  • Since then, nearly two million hectares of once barren land have been cleared and sown in grains, beans, and oil seeds.

    Academic text (2000)

  • In 1989, the Baskins sowed I. corei seeds in metal greenhouse flats, both on the soil surface and buried 3 centimeters below the surface.

    Academic text (1996)

  • If you want colorful flowers in your garden, you should sow seeds in spring.

  • To ensure a bountiful harvest, remember to sow the seeds evenly across the plot.

Synonyms

to plant
vsto sow in
361 1.0

To put seeds or young plants into the soil so they grow

is limited to placing seeds rather than inserting young living specimens
to sow
vsto sow in
45 1.8

To plant seeds in the ground so they grow

has identical meaning but appears as a two word phrasal form
to seed
vsto sow in
4 1.3

To put seeds in the ground to grow plants

refers only to placing reproductive material in soil, not to production
to broadcast
vsto sow in
  • Specialized
3 4.5

To scatter seeds widely over the ground

involves placing seeds directly rather than scattering them broadly
to sow seed
vsto sow in
1 2.2

To plant seeds in the ground so they can grow

is the two word form emphasizing placing seeds into soil
to inseminate
vsto sow in
1 8.2

Put seeds in the ground so they grow

is the everyday planting phrase rather than this more technical term

Antonyms

to uproot
38 4.4

To pull a plant out of the ground or force people to leave home

How Carefully

to plant
361 1.0
to sow in
1 3.4
to broadcast
  • Specialized
3 4.5

Surface Forms

sow in infinitive
sowing in present participle
sows in third person singular
sowed in past
sown in past participle

Morphology

sow + in

The meaning is directly built from 'sow' (to plant or scatter seeds) plus the locative preposition 'in' indicating placement into the ground; a learner who knows both words can derive 'to plant seeds in (the soil)'. This is a straightforward compositional verb+preposition construction that is cross-linguistically common, so it should be immediately comprehensible at B1.

Etymology

Sow in comes from the simple act of planting. The word sow means to put seeds and in shows putting them into the soil, so imagine pressing seeds into the ground — that's why it means 'to plant seeds'.