noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A flattened organ arising from the stem of a plant, often replacing the leaves in photosynthetic function, as leaves in such plants (such as asparagus or butcher's broom) are typically reduced to scales.
2. 2
   a flattened stem resembling and functioning as a leaf wordnet
3. 3
   A generally flattened shoot as of certain cactuses.

Synonyms

All synonyms

cladodiumcladophyllphyllocladphylloclade

Etymology

From New Latin cladodium, from Ancient Greek κλᾰ́δος (klắdos, “young slip of a tree”).

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.