Flow·er·ing, a. Bot. Having conspicuous flowers; -- used as an epithet with many names of plants; as, flowering ash; flowering dogwood; flowering almond, etc.
 Flowering fern, a genus of showy ferns (Osmunda), with conspicuous bivalvular sporangia. They usually grow in wet places.
 Flowering plants, plants which have stamens and pistils, and produce true seeds; phenogamous plants; -- distinguished from flowerless plants.
 Flowering rush, a European rushlike plant (Butomus umbellatus), with an umbel of rosy blossoms.
 flowering fern
      n 1: Australasian fern with clusters of sporangia on stems of
           fertile fronds [syn: Helminthostachys zeylanica]
      2: any fern of the genus Osmunda: large ferns with creeping
         rhizomes; naked sporangia are on modified fronds that
         resemble flower clusters [syn: osmund]