wild oats

alternative wild oat

1. pluralplural onlyOats of non-cultivated species of Avena, a genus of grasses.
2. pluralplural onlyChasmanthium latifolium, a grass, Indian woodoats
3. pluralplural onlySpecies of Uvularia, the bellworts.
4. pluralplural onlySpecies of Aegilops, goatgrass.
5. datedeuphemisticpluralplural onlyslangSexual intercourse outside of marriage.

   You had a harem instinct when you were young. You sowed your wild oats. So did you, Mater.

   1916, Joseph Noel, “Wild Oats”, in Three plays and a curtain raiser, page 138

   2 more examples

   Youths would better look at the specimens of disease taken by the surgeon from innocent wives, and see how they tally with the “wild oats” of some husband’s youth before they begin sowing their own. ¶ There are thousands of syphilitics and tens of thousands of gonorrheics in every large city in the world. Add to these the other wild oats products, crime, pauperism, prostitution, inebriety and insanity

   1912, G. Frank Lydston, The lie of the wild oats, page 3

   To allay our fears, we cracked the occasional joke about free love and began half-seriously calling it the Wild Oats Project.

   2015, Robin Rinaldi, The Wild Oats Project: One Woman's Midlife Quest for Passion at any Cost, page 49

6. archaicpluralplural onlyA rake.