# gardening

Pronunciation: US say "GAR-duhn-ing" /ˈɡɑɹ.dən.ɪŋ/; say "GAH-duhn-ing" UK /ˈɡɑː.dən.ɪŋ/, AUS /ˈɡɐː.dən.ɪŋ/

## Noun

1. The activity of cultivating soil and caring for plants, especially in a garden.
   - Simple: The work of growing plants and looking after a garden.
   - _Gardening can be both relaxing and surprisingly hard physical work._
   - _She turned her love of gardening into a small landscaping business._
3. The ongoing care, maintenance, or curation of something, especially digital content such as files, wikis, or collections.
   - Simple: The careful work of looking after and tidying something, often content kept online.
   - _The wiki stays useful only through constant gardening by its volunteers._
   - _Gardening of a large music library involves fixing tags and removing duplicates._
4. In cricket, a batsman's prodding or tapping of the pitch with the bat, usually to flatten bumps in the surface.
   - Simple: In cricket, tapping the ground with the bat to smooth out small bumps.
   - _The opener paused for some gardening after a delivery kicked up off a crack._
   - _His constant gardening between deliveries clearly frustrated the bowler._
5. The dropping of naval mines into water from an aircraft flying at low altitude. *(slang)*
   - Simple: Dropping mines into the sea from a low-flying aircraft.
   - _Bomber crews carried out gardening along the shipping lanes under cover of darkness._
   - _Months of gardening steadily disrupted enemy convoys in the channel._

## Verb

2. Present participle of garden. — present participle and gerund of garden
   - Simple: Present participle of garden. Use this form for the activity happening now or as the name of the activity.
   - _He was gardening when the storm rolled in._
   - _She enjoys gardening on quiet Sunday mornings._

## Origin

Formed from "garden" combined with the suffix "-ing."

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/gardening (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).