Word.ws English Dictionary

black palmer

black palmer noun: the larva of the turnip sawfly, an agricultural pest.

Noun

black palmer (plural black palmers)

  1. (colloquial, obsolete) The larva of the turnip sawfly, an agricultural pest
    • Mr. Wooldridge informed me, that on the first appearance of the insects, before he had himself observed them, one of his older neighbours remarked to him, that "the yellow flies which produce the black palmers were then abundant in the turnip fields;" […]1839, G. Newport, “Essay on the Turnip Fly”, in The Farmer's Magazine, page 123
    • The caterpillars of the Turnip Sawfly (Athalia spinarum) called ‘Niggers’ or ‘Black Palmers’ attack the leaves at a more advanced stage, and may be recognised by their dull yellow colour, and dense whitish short hairs.1901, John Weathers, A Practical Guide to Garden Plants ...

Synonyms of black palmer

Forms of black palmer

pluralblack palmers

Questions about black palmer

What does black palmer mean?
Black palmer means the larva of the turnip sawfly, an agricultural pest.
What part of speech is black palmer?
Black palmer is a noun.
What is the plural of black palmer?
The plural of black palmer is black palmers.

Words near black palmer in the dictionary

  1. black over Bill's mother's
  2. black oxide
  3. black oxides
  4. black pacu
  5. black pacus
  6. black palmer
  7. black palmers
  8. black panther
  9. Black Panther-esque
  10. black pantheresque
  11. black pantherlike

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: black palmer (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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