cull

/kʌl/ (bre, ipa) · /kʌl/ (ame, ipa) · /ˈkəl/ (ame, mw)

cull — verb

  • cullpresent simple I / you / we / they
  • cullshe / she / it
  • culledpast simple
  • culling-ing form

1. to kill some of a wild or farmed animal population on purpose, often the sick or

1.動詞及物C1
釋義

to kill some of a wild or farmed animal population on purpose, often the sick or weak ones, so the whole group does not grow too big or spread disease.

例句

The park rangers culled forty wild boar to protect the new oak saplings.

transitive: cull + [animal noun] + number/quantity

Farmers in the valley culled their chickens after the bird flu outbreak.

cull as a disease-control response

同義詞
  • thin out

    informal; can describe plants and animals

  • slaughter

    broader; covers killing for meat too, not just population control

  • harvest

    euphemism used by wildlife agencies

反義詞
  • protect

    to keep an animal population safe rather than reduce it

  • breed

    to grow a population rather than shrink it

文法句型

cull + [animal noun]

cull + number from + [group]

用法筆記

Subject is usually a public body (government, park rangers, farmers, conservation officers) acting on policy, not a lone hunter. Distinguish from sense 2: this sense is always about killing live animals; sense 2 is about selecting items from a larger pool.

常見錯誤

❌The chef culled the chicken for dinner.
✅The chef killed the chicken for dinner.
💡'cull' is about reducing a population, not slaughtering one animal for food.
❌The hunter culled a deer in the forest.
✅The rangers culled twenty deer in the forest.
💡'cull' usually takes a group or number as object, not a single animal.

2. to carefully choose useful things, such as facts, quotes, or examples, by going

2.動詞及物C1
釋義

to carefully choose useful things, such as facts, quotes, or examples, by going through many different sources and keeping only the best.

例句

Noor culled her best photos from over a thousand shots taken during the trip.

cull + [noun] + from + [source]

The research team culled key statistics from twenty years of hospital records.

formal: culling data from a large source

同義詞
  • glean

    very close in meaning; emphasises slow gathering of small pieces

  • select

    more general; doesn't imply a large pool to sift through

  • compile

    focuses on bringing items together, not on rejecting most

反義詞

文法句型

cull [noun] from [source]

cull [information/quotes/data] from [book/site/study]

用法筆記

Object is usually plural or uncountable content (quotes, data, examples, photos, names), and the source is named with 'from'. Often passive: 'X were culled from Y'. Distinguish from sense 1: no killing involved — this is selective gathering.

常見錯誤

❌She culled one quote from the book.
✅She picked one quote from the book.
💡'cull' implies sifting through many items, not picking a single one.
❌I culled the information.
✅I culled the information from old reports.
💡sense 2 usually needs a 'from + source' phrase to feel complete.

cull — noun