Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Stalk \Stalk\, n. [OE. stalke, fr. AS. st[ae]l, stel, a stalk.
   See {Stale} a handle, {Stall}.]
   1. (Bot.)
      (a) The stem or main axis of a plant; as, a stalk of
          wheat, rye, or oats; the stalks of maize or hemp.
      (b) The petiole, pedicel, or peduncle, of a plant.

   2. That which resembes the stalk of a plant, as the stem of a
      quill. --Grew.

   3. (Arch.) An ornament in the Corinthian capital resembling
      the stalk of a plant, from which the volutes and helices
      spring.

   4. One of the two upright pieces of a ladder. [Obs.]

            To climd by the rungs and the stalks. --Chaucer.

   5. (Zo["o]l.)
      (a) A stem or peduncle, as of certain barnacles and
          crinoids.
      (b) The narrow basal portion of the abdomen of a
          hymenopterous insect.
      (c) The peduncle of the eyes of decapod crustaceans.

   6. (Founding) An iron bar with projections inserted in a core
      to strengthen it; a core arbor.

   {Stalk borer} (Zo["o]l.), the larva of a noctuid moth
      ({Gortyna nitela}), which bores in the stalks of the
      raspberry, strawberry, tomato, asters, and many other
      garden plants, often doing much injury.