often attributive
1
: land in or predominantly in grass
2
: a tract of grassland: such as
a
: a large area of level or rolling land in the Mississippi River valley that in its natural uncultivated state usually has deep fertile soil, a cover of tall coarse grasses, and few trees
b
: one of the dry treeless plateaus east of the Rocky Mountains that merge on their east side with the prairies proper and are characterized by shorter grasses and drier less fertile soil
Examples of prairie in a Sentence
Millions of buffalo once roamed the prairies.
The train tracks extend over miles of prairie.
Recent Examples on the Web
As the sun sets over the 9,098 acres of marsh and prairie, Plumier teaches his pupils about the human history of frog consumption, amphibian identification and state regulations.
—
Sophie Hartley, IndyStar, 9 Sep. 2025
Between the marquee peaks of Glacier and Yellowstone National Parks lies a stretch of prairie where the land rolls wide and unbroken, and the only crowds are herds of bison.
—Evie Carrick, Travel + Leisure, 9 Sep. 2025
In Houston, Woltz draped swaths of prairie across Memorial Drive, allowing joggers, deer, and armadillos to move through the landscape and hardly register the presence of a six-lane road.
—Justin Davidson, Curbed, 9 Sep. 2025
The giants of Silicon Valley have a lot in common with Laura Ingalls Wilder, who portrayed her life on the prairie as a triumph of self-sufficiency, barely mentioning that the government underwrote the railroads, provided the farmland and tided the family through rough winters.
—Binyamin Appelbaum, Mercury News, 5 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for prairie
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Sophie Hartley, IndyStar, 9 Sep. 2025
Between the marquee peaks of Glacier and Yellowstone National Parks lies a stretch of prairie where the land rolls wide and unbroken, and the only crowds are herds of bison.
—Evie Carrick, Travel + Leisure, 9 Sep. 2025
In Houston, Woltz draped swaths of prairie across Memorial Drive, allowing joggers, deer, and armadillos to move through the landscape and hardly register the presence of a six-lane road.
—Justin Davidson, Curbed, 9 Sep. 2025
The giants of Silicon Valley have a lot in common with Laura Ingalls Wilder, who portrayed her life on the prairie as a triumph of self-sufficiency, barely mentioning that the government underwrote the railroads, provided the farmland and tided the family through rough winters.
—Binyamin Appelbaum, Mercury News, 5 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for prairie
Cite this Entry
“Prairie.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/prairie. Accessed 11 Sep. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
prairie
noun
prai·rie
ˈpre(ə)r-ē 
: a large area of level or rolling grassland
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