weedinessn.
/ˈwiːdɪnᵻs/, U.S. /ˈwidinᵻs/ 1.
a. The quality or fact of being full of or overgrown with weeds.
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1660 G. Mackenzie Aretina iii. 304 He stored therewith the gardens both of Court and Country, which was formerly judged impossible, because of the largeness of the one, and weediness of the other.
1676 A. Sammes Britannia Antiqua Illustrata 62 We know a River in Sicily called Danus by the Phœnicians, for its Weediness.
1789 W. H. Marshall Rural Econ. Gloucestershire I. xxvi. 150 Proportioned to their ripeness, their weediness, and the state of the weather, they are made up into wads or bundles.
1866 D. B. Cassesday Hortons viii. 62 The weediness of the spaces and rankness of the thistles.
1911 Elgin (Illinois) Dairy Rep. 8 July The crop is short beyond all doubt, and because of abnormal weediness it is of poor average feeding quality.
1940 Amer. Cattle Producer Apr. 34/1 Europeans traveling through the American countryside are likely to be shocked by the weediness of American fields and fence rows.
2005 Washington Post (Nexis) 13 Oct. (Final ed.) t6 Their mid-size yard..retains a landscaped look, without the unkempt weediness that might irritate the neighbors.
b. With reference to a plant: the quality or fact of being or resembling a weed.
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1897 Science 21 May 790/1 Nevertheless the family is eminent both as to variability and potential weediness. The sedges crowd out pretty much everything else on their own ground.
1907 Country Life 8 June 839/2 They [sc. Periwinkles] have been accused of weediness.
1912 Garden Mag. Jan. 256/1 The plant is coarse almost to the point of weediness.
1945 Amer. Midland Naturalist 34 288 It is no more possible to formulate a satisfactory definition of ‘weediness’ than it is to recommend a foolproof method of control.
1981 Washington Post (Nexis) 15 Nov. (Final ed.) e1 There is no way in God's world to disguise the basic weediness of a dahlia.
2017 Guardian (Nexis) 14 June (Environment section) I'm an admirer of ground elder... I like the complexity of the flower, the anise flavour of the leaves and the sheer audacity of the plant's irrepressible weediness.
2. colloquial. The quality or condition of being thin, weak, or feeble; esp. (with reference to a person) weedy appearance, physique, or character.
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the world > life > the body > bodily constitution > bodily weakness > [noun]
wokenessc1000
unstrengthc1175
frailnessa1300
weaknessa1300
brotelhede1340
frailtyc1384
tendernessa1387
slackness1398
unmain?a1400
unmight?a1400
feebility1413
fragility1474
infirmity1590
strengthlessness1666
feebleness1684
akrasia1806
weediness1860
1860 Bell's Life in London 11 Mar. 4/4 The only way to correct the softness and weediness of the racers of the present day.
1863 Baily's Monthly Mag. Dec. 201 A lately growing tendency to degeneracy and weediness [sc. among thoroughbred horses].
1874 Country 30 July 94/2 The Dandie being a vermin dog and not a toy, any tendency to weediness should be marked against him.
1924 P. G. Wodehouse Bill the Conqueror v. 103 He had a certain weediness, a lack of thews and sinews.
1955 Times 14 July 10/6 Weediness, conformity, timidity, aspirations and all, off went George to Stockholm.
1988 Sunday Times (Nexis) 2 Oct. A certain vocal weediness actually seems to enhance the confessional quality of the album.
2007 Sunday Express (Scottish ed.) (Nexis) 4 Feb. 27 Take Daniel Radcliffe, famous as Harry Potter, an icon of adolescent bespectacled weediness, who conquers all despite his pasty limbs.
3. Weedy taste or flavour.
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the world > physical sensation > taste and flavour > unsavouriness > [noun] > unpalatability
untoothsomeness1623
unpalatableness1712
degoust1716
unpalatability1848
soddenness1883
weediness1896
1896 ‘M. Harland’ Home of Bible xxvii. 253 We find in them no particular odor of any kind beyond a certain rank weediness shared by them with scores of other plants.
1903 Jrnl. Agric. & Industry (S. Austral.) 1 Oct. 178 Pasteurization would do away with weediness in the cream.
1979 New York 10 Sept. 77/1 Both have the distinctive and recognizable weediness characteristic of Sauvignon Blanc.
1989 C. Clark Amer. Wines of Northwest i. iii. 90 There has also been a nagging weediness or vegetative quality in some Merlots.
2006 N.Y. Sun (Nexis) 30 Aug. (Food & Drink section) 17 This is an unusually rich, ripe-tasting Chinon, almost devoid of the herbal-vegetal weediness that afflicts so many Loire Valley reds.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2019; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
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