cottonwood

name

1. A surname.
2. A town in Houston County, Alabama.
3. A city in Yavapai County, Arizona.
4. A census-designated place in Shasta County, California.
5. A ghost town in Yolo County, California.
6. A former census-designated place and unincorporated community in Douglas County, Colorado, mostly now incorporated into the town of Parker.
7. An unincorporated community in Fayetteville, Fayette County, Georgia, United States.
8. A city in Idaho County, Idaho.
9. A city in Lyon County, Minnesota.
10. A small unincorporated community in Coal County, Oklahoma.
11. An unincorporated community in Sequoyah County, Oklahoma.
12. A tiny town in Jackson County, South Dakota.
13. An unincorporated community in Callahan County, Texas.
14. A city in Kaufman County, Texas.

noun

Etymology: From cotton + wood.

1. A tree from one of number of species of tree in the genus Populus (poplars), typically growing along watercourses, with fluffy catkins.

   “Between these canyons the river has a low but rather narrow flood plain, with cottonwood groves scattered here and there, and a chaparral of mesquite bearing beans and thorns.”

   “[…] and through the middle of this forest, from wall to wall, ran a winding line of brilliant green which marked the course of cottonwoods and willows.”

2. Populus sect. Aigeiros, a taxonomic section of the poplar genus
3. A cottonwood hibiscus (Talipariti tiliaceum, syn. Hibiscus tiliaceus), a flowering shrub or tree in the mallow family.
4. A tree of species Ceiba pentandra, native to the American tropics and west Africa; silk-cotton tree.

   “There is no break in the trees. That is the wonder and the mystery of it. There where you see light-green rushes instead of dark-green undergrowth, there between the great cotton woods, that is my private gate into the unknown.”

5. Several species of trees endemic to New Zealand.