Meaning of wolf tree | Babel Free

Definitions

A large forest tree whose size and spreading branches suggest that the environment around it was formerly a clearing without other trees.

Equivalents

Examples

“That wolf tree looks much older than the trees around it. I'd bet this was an empty field when it was young.”

“WOLF TREE A "wolf" tree is a tree within a woods, its size and form, large trunk and horizontal branches, anomalous to the environs of slim-trunked trees with upright branches. It is a clue to the open field in which it once grew alone. — Anne Whiston Spirn, The Language of Landscape / The wolf tree's arms reach out […]”

“Watch for a huge white oak, a "wolf tree," standing massive among younger trees. […] "wolf trees." These trees, obviously much larger than trees of the surrounding forest, were once "lone wolves"; for example, a white oak that once shaded a home, or a tree in a grazing pasture.”

CEFR level