Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
cholla [chohl-yah, -yuh; Spanish chaw-yah] ExamplesWord Origin noun, plural chol·las [chohl-yahz, -yuh z; Spanish chaw-yahs] /ˈtʃoʊl yɑz, -yəz; Spanish ˈtʃɔ yɑs/.
- any of several spiny treelike cacti belonging to the genus Opuntia, especially O. fulgida of the southwestern U.S. and Mexico, having knobby outgrowths and yellow spines.
Origin of cholla 1855–60, Americanism; Mexican Spanish cholla head (perhaps Old French (dial.) cholle ball keel1 Examples from the Web for cholla Contemporary Examples of cholla
He had scratches on his wrist, maybe from a cholla cactus or from sleeping under a mesquite tree.
Arizona’s Immigrant Death Spiral
Bryan Curtis
July 28, 2010
Historical Examples of cholla
Among these the cholla is at once one of the most fascinating and the most exasperating.
The Book of the National Parks
Robert Sterling Yard
Cholla (Opuntia fulgida) ranges from Nevada southward into Mexico.
Henry H. Gibson
So if you are to see this phenomenon you will have to be on time, for Cholla never wait.
John James Thornber
Very cautiously a man emerged from behind a clump of cholla.
William MacLeod Raine
The dried heaps of cholla stirred as if unseen paws had pressed them.
Honor Willsie Morrow
British Dictionary definitions for cholla cholla noun
- any of several spiny cacti of the genus Opuntia that grow in the southwestern US and Mexico and have cylindrical stem segmentsSee also prickly pear
Word Origin for cholla Mexican Spanish, from Spanish: head, perhaps from Old French (dialect) cholle ball, of Germanic origin