climber vs stalk

climber

noun
  • A plant such as a vine that climbs upwards as it grows by attaching itself to some support. 

  • A person who is constantly trying to get ahead socially. 

  • Any structure on a playground designed to be climbed on. 

  • A bird that climbs, such as a parrot or woodpecker; specifically (archaic), a bird having two toes pointing forward, and two pointing backward, formerly regarded as being from the order Scansores or Zygodactyli (now obsolete as the birds formerly in this order have been reclassified into different orders); a zygodactyl. 

  • A cyclist who specializes in riding especially well on steep hills or roads. 

  • Synonym of climbing iron (“a kind of crampon attached to the shoe to aid with climbing”) 

stalk

noun
  • The stem or main axis of a plant, which supports the seed-carrying parts. 

  • An iron bar with projections inserted in a core to strengthen it; a core arbor. 

  • The petiole, pedicel, or peduncle of a plant. 

  • One of the two upright pieces of a ladder. 

  • A stem or peduncle, as in certain barnacles and crinoids. 

  • A particular episode of trying to follow or contact someone. 

  • The narrow basal portion of the abdomen of a hymenopterous insect. 

  • The peduncle of the eyes of decapod crustaceans. 

  • The hunting of a wild animal by stealthy approach. 

  • An ornament in the Corinthian capital resembling the stalk of a plant, from which the volutes and helices spring. 

  • Something resembling the stalk of a plant, such as the stem of a quill. 

  • A haughty style of walking. 

verb
  • To (try to) follow or contact someone constantly, often resulting in harassment.ᵂᵖ 

  • To walk haughtily. 

  • To walk behind something, such as a screen, for the purpose of approaching game; to proceed under cover. 

  • To walk slowly and cautiously; to walk in a stealthy, noiseless manner. 

  • To approach slowly and quietly in order not to be discovered when getting closer. 

How often have the words climber and stalk occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )