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waterfowl

nounC1Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #15,246 of 15,258mostly written

Waterfowl are birds that live on or near water. Shoot waterfowl, a waterfowl reserve, waterfowl on the lake.

The word is the same in the singular and the plural, like fowl itself. It covers ducks, geese and swans in ordinary use, and wetland reserves count waterfowl each winter because the numbers tell you the health of the whole habitat.

Definitions of waterfowl

  1. 1nounwaterfowlBirds that live on or near water.C1

    “Ducks, geese and other waterfowl gathered on the frozen lake.”

waterfowl is a bird.

Where it comes from

Water plus fowl, in Middle English. Fowl is Old English fugol and once meant any bird.

  1. Middle English

    waterfoul

  2. English, today

    waterfowl

From Middle English waterfoul, water-foul, equivalent to water + fowl. Compare Old English dopfugel (“waterfowl, moorhen”) literally “dipping-fowl”.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

waterfowl in the wild

  • Fowl are birds belonging to one of two biological orders, namely the gamefowl or landfowl (Galliformes) and the waterfowl (Anseriformes).

    Fowl

  • The refuge is a stop for migratory waterfowl flying between Canada and Mexico.

    Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge

  • Ducks Unlimited (DU) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to the conservation of wetlands and associated upland habitats for waterfowl, other wildlife, and people.

    Ducks Unlimited

  • There are around 3 million waterfowl hunters in the United States alone.

    Waterfowl hunting

  • Delta Waterfowl Foundation is a non-profit organization operating in both Canada and in the United States, whose mission is to secure the future of waterfowl and waterfowl hunting.

    Delta Waterfowl Foundation

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.