grafting

Everyday

1. Grafting is joining a piece cut from one plant onto another plant so that they grow together, as gardeners do with apple trees. tree →
2. (medicine) Grafting is moving healthy skin or other tissue from one part of the body to another to repair it, for example after a bad burn. tree →
3. (UK, informal) Grafting means working very hard, especially at tiring work: «He's been grafting all day». tree →
4. (US) Graft is also using power dishonestly to get money, a kind of corruption. tree →

In the lessons

In science and gardening lessons it explains how fruit trees are grown; in health lessons it explains skin grafts. In British everyday talk a «grafter» is a hard worker. Phrases: «skin grafting», «grafting a tree», «hard graft».

Examples

• The gardener is grafting a branch onto the apple tree. tree →
• Grafting lets one tree grow two kinds of apples. tree →
• After the fire she needed skin grafting on her arm. tree →
• (UK) Dad's been grafting on the building site all week. tree →
• (UK) Our team won because everyone was grafting. tree →
• (UK) Learning to play the piano takes hard graft. tree →
• (US) The mayor was accused of graft. tree →
• We tried grafting cactus plants in science club. tree →

Note

Graft is regular: grafted, grafting. In the UK, «graft» as hard work is informal and a compliment; in the US, «graft» as corruption is very negative. A «grafter» (UK) is a hard worker.