bear fruit

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bear fruit (third-person singular simple present bears fruit, present participle bearing fruit, simple past bore fruit, past participle borne fruit)

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see bear,‎ fruit.

   After several barren years it was good to see the trees bearing fruit.

2. (idiomatic) To succeed in some task; to achieve benefit from a task or project.

   Many people had looked but it was unusual to see these searches bearing fruit.

   • 1946 November and December, “Notes and News: Additional London-Dartford Services”, in Railway Magazine, page 386:

     Although the trains are still far from becoming overcrowded, it is understood that the efforts to make the services more widely known have borne fruit.

   • 2018 July 7, Phil McNulty, “Sweden 0-2 England”, in BBC Sport‎:

     Maguire, outstanding once more, broke the deadlock on the half-hour when another England set-piece bore fruit - Leicester City's powerful defender flashing a header past Sweden keeper Robin Olsen from Ashley Young's corner.