germinate

What it means

1. intransitiveagricultureOf a seed, to begin to grow, to sprout roots and leaves.

   the Chalcites, which hath a Spirit that will put forth and germinate

   1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC

   3 more examples

   It would suffice to keep up the full number of a tree, which lived on an average for a thousand years, if a single seed were produced once in a thousand years, supposing that this seed were never destroyed, and could be ensured to germinate in a fitting place. So that in all cases, the average number of any animal or plant depends only indirectly on the number of its eggs or seeds.

   1859, Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species

   Orchids rely on fungi to reproduce. Their tiny seeds don't have any on-board nutrients (like beans and apples) and will not germinate until they are infected by a symbiotic fungus which supplies them with food. Known as a protocorm, this tiny orchid-fungus ball grows, turns green and eventually starts to photosynthesise.

   2014 April 5, “Quite interesting: A quietly intriguing column from the brains behind QI, the BBC quiz show. This week; QI orchids you not”, in The Daily Telegraph (Weekend), page W22

   […] The flesh [of the mistletoe berry] is sticky, and forms strings and ribbons between my thumb and forefinger. For the mistletoe, this viscous goop – and by the way, viscous comes to English from viscum – is crucial. The stickiness means that, after eating the berries, birds often regurgitate the seeds and then wipe their bills on twigs – leading to the seeds' getting glued to the tree, where they can germinate and begin the cycle anew.

   2014 December 23, Olivia Judson, “The hemiparasite season [print version: Under the hemiparasite, International New York Times, 24–25 December 2014, page 7]”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 23 Dec 2014

2. transitiveTo cause to grow; to produce.

   These were business hours, and a feeling of loneliness crept over him, perhaps germinated by his sight of the illustrated papers, and accentuated by an attempted perusal of them.

   1913, Robert Barr, chapter 5, in Lord Stranleigh Abroad

In a sentence

the Chalcites, which hath a Spirit that will put forth and germinate

1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC

Where it comes from

1. Latingermen, germinis“shoot, sprout, bud”
2. Englishgerminate

From oblique stem of Latin germen, germinis (“shoot, sprout, bud”) + -ate, from germinātus (“sprouted, budded, grown”), past participle of germinō (“to sprout, bud, grow”), from germen, germinis (“shoot, sprout, bud”).