Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. of a horse, weak-legged, lacking strength.

1800		Sporting Mag. XV. 107: The poor, slight, weedy, spindle-shanked stock of brood mares.
1830		Westmorland Gaz. 13 Nov. 3/4: There were [...] many light-leggy, weedy things in the [horse] market.
1843		R.S. Surtees Handley Cross 226: He rode a weedy chestnut.
1888		‘Rolf Boldrewood’ Robbery Under Arms (1922) 175: Every kind of harness horse was worth forty, fifty, a hundred pounds apiece [...] some of them weedy and bad enough.
1895		‘Banjo’ Paterson ‘The Man from Snowy River’ in Man from Snowy River (1902) 4: And one was there, a stripling on a small and weedy beast, / He was something like a racehorse undersized.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 24 Mar. 24/4: Young Lieut. Roberts [...] gave a great account of a weedy Arab-blooded animal he had bought – or ‘found’ – at a Boer farm.

2. of humans, weak, cowardly, spineless.

1853		R.S. Surtees Mr Sponge’s Sporting Tour 105: Hate a weedy woman — fifteen two and a half — that’s to say, five feet four’s plenty of height for a woman.
1866		E. Gaskell Wives and Daughters (1905) 82: I’ll bring Grace, who is looking rather pale and weedy.
1899		T.W.H. Crosland ‘The Bold Militiaman’ in Absent-Minded Mule and Verses 13: We’re under height and weedy, / About our little chestsies.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 13 Mar. 5/1: The weedy gentleman concluded with impressive severity.
1908		A.N. Lyons Arthur’s 250: A couple of blotched-faced, weedy boys.
1912		E. Pugh City Of The World 243: Some weedy leader of a gang of hooligans or some young gallows-bird.
1920		A. Christie Mysterious Affair at Styles (1954) 77: My attention was arrested by a weedy-looking young man rushing down the street.
1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 155: The failures of the class, sitting by themselves in a weedy group.
1930		H. Ashton Doctor Serocold (1936) 171: They were a weedy, second-rate, effeminate lot, to my mind.
1942		W. Pegler George Spelvin Chats 103: Speculating whether she was married and if so whether her husband was a big, dumb, jealous brute or some weedy little squirt.
1949		R. Chandler Little Sister 86: The creature with him was a weedy number.
1957		J. Hawke Follow my Dust! 49: There were no scowlers in Broken Hill, no weedy youths or jaded men.
1963		K. Amis letter 26 Aug. in Leader (2000) 640: When Hickey finally did his stuff it was a weedy little smear.
1979		Lette & Carey Puberty Blues 84: Mr Berkoff [...] pointed at some weedy little first former.
1981		A. Weller Day of the Dog 35: They intended to beat up this weedy pale youth and root his fat black boong senseless.
1999		Guardian Guide 12–18 June 98: Joined by weedy, sneering rap-metal vet Kid Rock.
2000		N. Griffiths Grits 74: Phil sits back [...] an folds is twiggy fuckin arms over is weedy fuckin chest.

3. of things, boring, troublesome, small, insignificant.

1925		S. Lewis Arrowsmith 15: He rarely left his small brown weedy house.
1958		Willans & Searle Complete Molesworth (1985) 35: For essays english masters give us weedy things like – A trip in a space ship. [Ibid.] 169: Successful conkers are always shriveled and weedy.
1966		Current Sl. I:3 8/1: Weedy, adj. Whimsical or ridiculous.

4. of speech, indistinct, unemphatic.

1989

T. Blacker Fixx 84: With a weedy, ‘Some other time, Luigi,’ [he] left the shop.