polyculturen.
/ˈpɒlɪkʌltʃə/, U.S. /ˈpɑliˌkəltʃər/ Agriculture.
1. The simultaneous cultivation or exploitation of several different crops or animals. Cf. monoculture n. 1.
ΘΚΠ
the world > food and drink > farming > cultivation or tillage > [noun] > systems of cultivation
round tilth1723
infield and outfield1733
terrace1796
superculture1835
terrace-cultivation1860
terrace-culture1863
conservation tillage1897
monoculture1901
strip farming1913
polyculture1915
sailab1916
shifting cultivation1922
strip-cultivation1932
shifting agriculture1934
strip-cropping1936
podu1938
contour terracing1939
strip system1954
swiddening1971
monocropping1974
1915 C. R. Enock Tropics xl. 439 It is not to ‘monoculture’ but to ‘polyculture’—that is, to varied production as contrasted with single products—that any community must look for its economic and social security.
1977 Audubon Jan. 31/2 They would like to use them in polyculture ponds where food that other fish miss or pass out as waste will feed the zooplankton which will, in turn, feed the paddlefish.
2003 Independent 4 Aug. 6/2 Polyculture is the way forward for many salmon farms.
2. An instance of polyculture; an area in which polyculture is practised; a crop grown by polyculture.
ΚΠ
1950 Population Stud. 4 347 Sources of labour for the vine and cereal polyculture of the small and medium holdings of the Pyrenees.
1974 Oryx 12 358 A polyculture of wild ungulates can be likened to a sophisticated system of crop rotation at a secondary level.
1994 Sci. Amer. July 21/2 The drawings show the result of such a calculation comparing a polyculture (growing several different crops on a hectare of land) with a monoculture.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2006; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1915