Obs. exc. dial. (See quots. 1618, 1699 and cf. WATER-SHOOTS.)
1387. Trevisa, Higden, V. 263. As water bowes beeþ i-kutte and i-hewe of treen. Ibid. (1398), Barth. De P. R., XVII. ii. (1495), 604. Yf water bowes and superfluyte ben pared of: the tree bereth the beter and the more fruyte.
1523–34. Fitzherb., Husb., § 129. Cut away all the water-bowes, and the small bowes, that the pryncipall bowes may haue the more sap.
1591. Greene, Farew. to Follie, Wks. (Grosart), IX. 259. As the fairest Cedar hath his water boughes,… and the sweetest rose his prickle: so in a crowne is hidden far more care than content.
1618. W. Lawson, New Orchard & Garden, xi. (1623), 38. Water boughes, or vndergrowth, are such boughes as grow low vnder others and are by them ouergrowne, ouershadowed, dropped on, and pinde for want of plentie of sap.
1699. Meager, New Art Garden., 46. Take the Water-boughs away, which are those on the Standards that are shaded, and dropt upon, remaining smooth and naked without Buds.
1871. Kingsley, At Last, xi. The stem rises, without a fork, for sixty feet or more, and rolls out at the top into a head very like that of an elm trimmed up, and like an elm too in its lateral water-boughs.
