wild potato vine
- noun
- US
:
batata silvestre
- Botanists studied the wild potato vine to learn more about the origins of the sweet potato.
Examples
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Farmers in the region sometimes harvest the massive root of the wild potato vine for food.
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The wild potato vine sprawled across the garden, its leaves providing ground cover.
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The wild potato vine grows abundantly in tropical regions.
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Have you ever seen a wild potato vine?
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Farmers in the region sometimes harvest the massive root of the wild potato vine for food.
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Botanists studied the wild potato vine to learn more about the origins of the sweet potato.
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The wild potato vine sprawled across the garden, its leaves providing ground cover.
Synonyms
A climbing tropical plant with a large root used for food and related to the sweet potato
A tropical climbing plant with a large starchy root often harvested for food
A tropical climbing plant with a very large starchy root used as food
A tropical plant that grows along the ground or climbs and has a large starchy root used as food
A tropical plant with a very large root full of starch like a sweet potato
A plant with large starchy roots like a sweet potato
A climbing plant with pretty flowers and small edible potatoes
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is directly compositional: 'wild' (growing naturally) modifies 'potato vine', and 'potato' + 'vine' straightforwardly denotes a vine-like plant related to potatoes. This kind of noun-noun (+ adjective) combination is a common, predictable compounding pattern across languages, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents can readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Wild potato vine uses the words wild, potato, and vine to paint a simple picture: a climbing or trailing plant with a big, starchy root that looks like a potato. People in tropical America ate or studied that potato-like root, and because the plant is an early relative of the sweet potato, the name explains why we call it a wild potato vine.
