Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Having feathers or featherlike growths; feathered.
  • adjective Resembling a plume; feathery.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Feathery: plumous; resembling a feather, as something light, airy, and spray-like.
  • Feathered; plumed or plumaged; provided with plumes or feathers.
  • In botany, feathery or feathered: specifically noting bristles, etc., which have fine hairs on opposite sides like the vane of a feather. A plumose pappus is one composed of feathery hairs. See fig. b under pappus.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Having feathers or plumes.
  • adjective Having hairs, or other párts, arranged along an axis like a feather; feathery; plumelike

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Having feathers or plumes.
  • adjective Having hairs, or other parts, arranged along an axis like a feather; feathery; plumelike; as, a plumose leaf; plumose tentacles.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective having an ornamental plume or feathery tuft

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin plūmōsus, from plūma, feather.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin plūmōsus ("feathered"), from plūma ("feather"): compare French plumeux.

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Examples

  • The pilings are covered with plumose anemones, invertebrate filter feeders.

    Field & Stream 2010

  • Both features help pollen grains adhere to their bodies, but they also have specialized pollen-carrying structures; in most bees, this takes the form of a structure known as the scopa, which is on the hind legs of most bees, and/or the lower abdomen (e.g., of megachilid bees), made up of thick, plumose setae.

    Pollinator Wikipedia 2009

  • The granite's granophyric groundmass consists of intergrown quartz and potassium feldspar (~Or45), the latter consisting of plumose splays that nucleated directly from pre-existing phenocrysts.

    Granophyre.html 1998

  • One of our agents copied the letter before it was sent and it reads, "le sept plumose, Van six de la Republique Frangaise."

    Sharpe's Tiger Cornwell, Bernard 1997

  • The terminal position of the inflorescence, its protrusion far above the level of the foliage leaves, the swinging and dangling anthers, the abundance of non-sticking pollen and the plumose stigmas are all intended to facilitate pollination by wind.

    A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari

  • The styles are slender and distinct with plumose stigmas exserted at the top of the spikelet.

    A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari

  • Citrate: antennae with very long, curled lateral branches which may or may not be ciliated; see plumose.

    Explanation of Terms Used in Entomology John. B. Smith

  • Styles are short, with plumose stigmas and laterally exserted.

    A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari

  • Ovary is glabrous with two styles ending in plumose stigmas.

    A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari

  • Styles are free with plumose stigmas, laterally exserted.

    A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses K. Rangachari

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