spotted Joe-Pye weed
- noun
- US
:
hierba de Joe-Pye manchada
- The tall stems and purple flowers of spotted Joe-Pye weed make it easy to identify in late summer.
Examples
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Gardeners often plant spotted Joe-Pye weed to attract butterflies and bees.
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We found a patch of spotted Joe-Pye weed growing along the riverbank.
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Look at that spotted Joe-Pye weed over there!
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The spotted Joe-Pye weed blooms beautifully in late summer.
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Gardeners often plant spotted Joe-Pye weed to attract butterflies and bees.
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The tall stems and purple flowers of spotted Joe-Pye weed make it easy to identify in late summer.
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The spotted Joe-Pye weed blooms beautifully in late summer.
Synonyms
A tall North American plant with leaves that grow in circles and pink or purple flower clusters that attract butterflies
A tall North American wild plant with clusters of purple flowers that attract butterflies
A tall North American plant with pink or purple flower clusters found in wet places
Surface Forms
Morphology
A B1 learner who knows 'spotted' and 'weed' can infer this is a kind of (likely spotted) plant, so part of the meaning is recoverable from the constituents. However 'Joe-Pye' is a proper name for a specific species and does not contribute predictable semantic content, so the full referential meaning (a particular North American herb with pinkish flower clusters) is not derivable from the parts.
Etymology
Spotted Joe-Pye weed is named after a man called Joe Pye, who, one popular story says, used the plant as a folk medicine to 'treat fevers'. The word spotted points to dark marks on its stems, so the name helps people picture this tall plant with pink or purple flower clusters today.
