diœcious

A form of dioecious — Having the male and female reproductive organs on separate plants (of the same species) rather than different parts of the same plant.

Meanings

adjectivediœcious (not comparable)
  1. alternativenot comparableAlternative spelling of dioecious.

    …several of the Medusæ, probably all, are diœcious…

    1840, Penny Cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, volume 18, page 136
    4 more examples

    Low, creeping, heath-like shrubs, with small, crowded, entire, evergreen, leaves, and minute, axillary, diœcious flowers.

    1878: George Bentham, Handbook of the British flora, p415 (Brook)

    These berries will remain from December to July, that is, about eight months of the year. The Aucuba is diœcious. About a hundred years ago a traveller first brought some of these evergreens to England…

    1879, Catherine M. Buckton, Town and window gardening, 16 lectures, page 91

    Heads many-flowered ; the flowers all tubular, perfect and similar, or rarely imperfectly diœcious. Scales of the ovoid or spherical involucre imbricated in many rows, tipped with a point or prickle.

    1879, Asa Gray, Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States, Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor & co., page 273

    Scalibregma inflatum is diœcious, and not hermaphrodite, as described by Danielssen. The gonads are formed by proliferation of the cells covering the septum by which the nephrostome is attached to the body-wall.

    1927: Arthur Everett Shipley, Juan Rivera Reyes, J. Antonio Gil Conca, and Spain Servicio de Publicaciones Agrícolas, Desinfección y procedimientos higiénicoterapéuticos de los granos y sus…, volume 72, p302 (Ministerio de Fomento)
Cite this entry
APA

diœcious. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/di%C5%93cious

MLA

“diœcious.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/di%C5%93cious. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “diœcious,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/di%C5%93cious.

Source: diœcious on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.