1 people, esp. employees, who are no longer useful: --
When she took over the agency, she streamlined the operation by getting rid of a lot of dead wood.
2 people or things that are no longer useful or effective: --
get rid of/clear out the dead wood If the company is to improve its performance, it needs to take this opportunity to get rid of some of the deadwood.
We think that 76% of all retail money is invested in funds which are effectively dead wood.
The moisture content of the dead wood in the moist and especially the wet forest could be too high for many wood-rotting fungal species to survive.
These are mainly generalist parasitoids which use their very long ovipositors to attack hosts living deep in dead wood.
Also, lianas may entangle many pieces of dead wood in the canopy and delay their fall to the ground.
The turnover rate of dead wood was lowest in the moist forest life zone where climatic conditions seemed to be most favourable for decomposition.
This may provide a basis for understanding the possible slower turnover rates of dead wood in wetter life zones.
The molluscan infauna of dead wood was also included, but no sieving for soil infauna was attempted.
After three years, the two sole survivors were seedlings which had established on dead wood.
The decomposition rates of dead wood can not be understood without information about the saprotrophic organisms involved.
