摘 (zhāi): to pick (fruit, flowers); to pl…

Meanings

1 to pick (fruit, flowers); to pluck
2 to take off; to remove (glasses, hat)
3 to select; to excerpt

Characters

摘

zhai

to pick; to pluck; to select

Examples

秋天我们去果园摘苹果。

Qiūtiān wǒmen qù guǒyuán zhāi píngguǒ.

In autumn we go to the orchard to pick apples.

请把帽子摘下来。

Qǐng bǎ màozi zhāi xiàlái.

Please take off your hat.

她摘了几朵花送给妈妈。

Tā zhāi le jǐ duǒ huā sònggěi māma.

She picked a few flowers for her mom.

他摘下了眼镜擦了擦。

Tā zhāi xià le yǎnjìng cā le cā.

He took off his glasses and wiped them.

Tips

usage

摘 for 'remove' is specifically for things worn on the body: 摘眼镜 (take off glasses), 摘帽子 (take off hat), 摘手表 (take off watch). For clothes, use 脱 (tuō).

Components

radical

扌 shǒu

hand (radical form of 手)

Hand radical on the left is the standard side-form of 手, marking 摘 as a manual action. It indexes 摘 in the hands-on verb family alongside 拿 to take, 抓 to grasp, 拔 to pluck out, 推 to push. Plucking fruit, removing a hat, pulling a flower — every sense of 摘 ends in a hand.

phonetic

啇 dí

stem; root (here phonetic)

Right side is 啇, an obscure component meaning stem or root, supplying the sound — dí drifting to zhāi via the standard d/zh alternation seen across this phonetic group. Same phonetic core sits in 滴 drop, 敌 enemy, 适 suitable, 嫡 legitimate-line. Hand + stem-root = the hand action of picking from a stem: hence 摘苹果 to pluck an apple.