Show sowing wild oats to sow wild oats means to commit youthful excesses to spend ones jonws youth in dissipation subsequent reform Is usually implied the expression it Is supposed originated among the country people of england the wild oats a tall grass resembling the cultivated oat and by some supposed to be its original progenitor la Is a common weed in groin grain fields it was natural that a n weed so common and obnoxious should become the subject of comparison among the english farmers at first sowing wild oats meant sowing worthless seed or seed which would produce a worthless crop the transition to tho the figurative meaning was easy tie who wastes the precious brecto us days of his youthful prime in dissipation Is sowing seeds which will grow up into obnoxious weeds pathfinder magazine |