Breeder

How to spell breeder

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce breeder

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does breeder mean?

1. nounA person who keeps animals or plants in order to produce young or new stock, often for sale.
2. nounA nuclear reactor that produces more fissile material than it consumes.

Breeder in a sentence

• The dog breeder insisted on meeting the new owners before any puppy left.

• The experimental breeder was designed to generate its own fuel as it ran.

• A reputable breeder keeps detailed records of each animal's pedigree.

• Engineers debated the safety record of every fast breeder ever built.

Where does breeder come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is built on the native English verb 'breed', which descends from the Old English brēdan, meaning to nourish, keep warm, or hatch young, a verb closely tied to brōd, the ancestor of 'brood'. The underlying sense was originally about applying warmth, as a hen does to her eggs, before it broadened to mean producing or rearing offspring generally. Adding the agent suffix '-er', a thoroughly Germanic way of naming the doer of an action, gives 'breeder', someone or something that breeds. The form has been used for people who raise animals or plants since the late medieval period, and later spread to technical senses such as nuclear reactors that generate fuel. The double 'e' that trips writers up simply preserves the long vowel of 'breed', a spelling pattern English keeps from its Old English roots.

How the word is built

• breed (Old English brēdan, to nourish or produce young)
• -er (agent suffix, one who does)