What Is the Difference Between Grove & Orchard?
A grove is a small group of trees without dense undergrowth, either growing wild or planted by humans. An orchard is also a group of trees without undergrowth, but which are planted specifically for the harvesting of a crop of fruit or nuts. Does this Spark an idea?
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Definition of Grove
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The primary meaning of "grove" is simply a group of trees that grow close together, generally without many bushes or other plants underneath. It is an old word in English, existing more than 1,000 years ago, but it's of unknown origin.
Another Meaning of Grove
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A secondary meaning of "grove" is a group of fruit or nut trees planted and harvested by people. In that sense, the word's meaning overlaps that of "orchard."
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Definiton of Orchard
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An "orchard" refers only to a planting of fruit or nut trees by people for the express purpose of harvesting a crop. The word is also very old, with roots in both Latin and Old English that literally mean "garden + yard."
Size
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Naturally occurring groves are typically small, perhaps a few acres at most. Orchards, by contrast, may be small or very large indeed, such as the apple orchards in Washington state; but to complicate matters, crops of oranges (as in Florida) are usually known as orange groves, and they too can be enormous.
Essential Difference
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All orchards are manmade, in the sense that they represent the planting of certain plants in certain places for certain reasons. Some groves are manmade, but the word also includes naturally occurring trees that happen to be clustered together.
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References
- Photo Credit Image by Flickr.com, courtesy of Noah
