Roymalika
Senior Member
Punjabi
- Feb 13, 2022
- #1
In Pakistan, the best season for planting/growing/cultivating wheat crop is winter season. It is then harvested in summer, in the months of June and July.
Self-made
Could you please explain the difference?
N
nutcase7
Senior Member
Melbourne Australia
French France
- Feb 13, 2022
- #2
If you are asking for the difference between 'planting, 'growing' and 'cultivating':
'planting' means putting a plant in the ground.
'growing' can mean the whole process or some of it from 'sowing the seed', 'planting the plant', 'watering' and 'feeding' the plant.
'cultivating' refers to the preparation of the soil for the seed or plant to go in.
rhitagawr
Senior Member
Wales
British English
- Feb 13, 2022
- #3
Plant means to put the seeds in the ground. Whether anything grows as a result of that is another matter.
Grow can be intransitive or transitive. Flowers grow. You can grow flowers.
Cultivate is similar to grow in is transitive sense. It sounds technical and literary. It refers to agricultural activity in general. I don't think you'd use it for what you do in a single season. We're cultivating wheat this year sounds odd to me.
Cross-posted. I see Nutcase7 emphasises tillage for cultivation. I'm not arguing with that.
Roymalika
Senior Member
Punjabi
- Feb 13, 2022
- #4
I think we can "plant" a crop (meaning put the seeds into the soil), and "grow" a crop (meaning the whole process: sowing the seed, planting the plant, watering and feeding the plant). But we cannot "cultivate" a crop. We can only cultivate a land/soil (meaning preparing/improving it for things we want to grow.)
Is that right?
The Newt
Senior Member
New England
English - US
- Feb 13, 2022
- #5
Roymalika said:
I think we can "plant" a crop (meaning put the seeds into the soil), and "grow" a crop (meaning the whole process: sowing the seed, planting the plant, watering and feeding the plant). But we cannot "cultivate" a crop. We can only cultivate a land/soil (meaning preparing/improving it for things we want to grow.)
Is that right?
Generally, yes. When you "cultivate" your garden you turn over the soil between plants and eliminate weeds.
The usage is different from when we refer to "cultivated plants" in distinction to "wild plants."
Roymalika
Senior Member
Punjabi
- Feb 13, 2022
- #6
The Newt said:
Generally, yes. When you "cultivate" your garden you turn over the soil between plants and eliminate weeds.
The usage is different from when we refer to "cultivated plants" in distinction to "wild plants."
So do you agree that we cannot "cultivate" a plant/crop and that we can only "cultivate" a land?
The Newt
Senior Member
New England
English - US
- Feb 13, 2022
- #7
Roymalika said:
So do you agree that we cannot "cultivate" a plant/crop and that we can only "cultivate" a land?
I wouldn't go that far. "Cultivate" is clearly used to mean "grow" in some contexts:
How to Cultivate Cotton Organically
But saying "the best season for cultivating wheat" could be confusing.
J
jannr
Senior Member
English-United States
- Feb 13, 2022
- #8
Cultivate is used frequently in passive sentences: Soy is cultivated in the Great Plains. Potatoes were first cultivated in Peru.
The same is true for cultivation, the noun form: Mexico ranks high in the cultivation of corn/maize.
Roymalika
Senior Member
Punjabi
- Feb 13, 2022
- #9
The Newt said:
But saying "the best season for cultivating wheat" could be confusing.
Could you explain how it can be confusing please?
The Newt
Senior Member
New England
English - US
- Feb 13, 2022
- #10
Roymalika said:
Could you explain how it can be confusing please?
Because we wouldn't know if it meant "cultivating" in the general sense of "growing" or in the specific sense of, for instance, hoeing the crop to eliminate weeds.
JulianStuart
Senior Member
Sonoma County CA
English (UK then US)
- Feb 13, 2022
- #11
Collins covers them all 
Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::
cultivate/ˈkʌltɪˌveɪt/vb (transitive)
- to till and prepare (land or soil) for the growth of crops
- to plant, tend, harvest, or improve (plants) by labour and skill
- to break up (land or soil) with a cultivator or hoe
dojibear
Senior Member
Fresno CA
English (US - northeast)
- Feb 13, 2022
- #12
Roymalika said:
But we cannot "cultivate" a crop. We can only cultivate a land/soil.
Those are two different meanings of "cultivate". As post #11 shows, you can "cultivate land" (meaning 1) or "cultivate plants/crops" (meaning 2). Different meanings.
Collins is a UK dictionary. The US version of meaning 2 is: "to promote or improve the growth of (a crop)."
The Newt said:
But saying "the best season for cultivating wheat" could be confusing.
The entire time period that wheat is growing is the time period for "cultivating wheat". Planting, watering, weeding, thinning, spraying for bugs, other stuff that farmers do to wheat -- it is all "cultivating wheat".
Wheat takes 7-8 months to grow. That is not one season. That is part of 3 seasons. A farmer is cultivating wheat for 3 seasons.
JulianStuart
Senior Member
Sonoma County CA
English (UK then US)
- Feb 13, 2022
- #13
MW, an AE dictionary has both definitions, but slightly different wording - comnparable in scope in 2 to the Collins.
cul·ti·vate | \ ˈkəl-tə-ˌvāt \cultivated; cultivating
Essential Meaning of cultivate
1: to prepare and use (soil) for growing plants Prehistoric peoples settled the area and began to cultivate the land.Some of the fields are cultivated while others lie fallow.
2: to grow and care for (plants)a plant that is cultivated for its fruit. They survived by cultivating vegetables and grain.
3: to grow or raise (something) under conditions that you can control pearls from cultivated oysters
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