a. [f. Gr. ἀνάδρομ-ος running up (a river) (f. ἀνά up + δρόμος running) + -OUS.]
1. Zool. Of fishes: Ascending rivers to spawn.
1753. Chambers, Cycl. Supp., Anadromous … denoting such [fishes] as have their times of going from the fresh water to the salt, and afterwards returning.
1843. Blackw. Mag., LIII. 640/1. The salmon is undoubtedly the finest and most magnificent of our fresh-water fishes, or rather of those anadromous kinds which … seek alternately the briny sea and the ‘rivers of water.’
1880. Times, 31 Dec., 6/1. The artificial propagation of Anadromous Fish other than the Salmon.
2. Bot. (See quot.)
1881. J. G. Baker, in Nature, XXIII. 480/2. Milde’s classification of ferns into a catadromous and anadromous series, according as to whether their lowest secondary branches originate on the posterior or anterior side of the pinnæ.
