Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Feeding on insects and other small invertebrates.
  • adjective Botany Capable of trapping insects or other small organisms and absorbing nutrients from them.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Feeding or subsisting on insects, as an animal or a plant.
  • Of or pertaining to the Insectivora, in any use of that name, or having their characters.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective plants which have some special adaptation for catching and digesting insects, as the sundew, Venus's flytrap, Sarracenia, etc.
  • adjective the Insectivora, and many bats, birds, and reptiles.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective feeding on insects
  • adjective of a plant capable of trapping and absorbing insects; such as the sundew, pitcher plant and Venus flytrap

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective (of animals and plants) feeding on insects

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Most carnivorous - "insectivorous" - plants do feed on insects and such buggy invertebrates.

    SFGate: Top News Stories 2010

  • I have been working for some time on a special subject, namely insectivorous plants.

    More Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 2 Charles Darwin 1845

  • It would be almost an impossibility to keep the purely insectivorous species, were it not for the fact that they can be gradually accustomed to feed on what is known as "insectivorous" or "insectile" food, a composition of which the principal ingredients generally consist of dried ants 'cocoons, dried flies, dried powdered meat, preserved yolk of egg, [1] and crumb of bread or biscuit.

    Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" Various

  • The extremely long, forked tail is nearly always a dead give-away that this species is insectivorous and captures its flying prey whilst both are on the wing.

    Mystery bird: scissor-tailed flycatcher, Tyrannus forficatus 2011

  • It is a migratory, insectivorous species, breeding mainly in forests in Siberia.

    Rare birds flock to British shores in record numbers 2011

  • Thus, the Conservatory Garden was pressed into service to evoke the bower—orchids, ivy, Virginia creeper, insectivorous plants and, of course, those primroses—at Down House, Darwin's home in Kent.

    Evolution of a Garden Joanne Kaufman 2011

  • These insectivorous birds are found from the southwestern U.S. through Honduras in Central America.

    Mystery bird: Ladder-backed woodpecker, Picoides scalaris | @GrrlScientist 2011

  • Thus, the Conservatory Garden was pressed into service to evoke the bower—orchids, ivy, Virginia creeper, insectivorous plants and, of course, those primroses—at Down House, Darwin's home in Kent.

    Evolution of a Garden Joanne Kaufman 2011

  • In collaboration with Professor Cutler J. Cleveland (Boston University) and Jeff Frank (Indigo Systems Corporation), and Gary McCracken (University of Tennessee), we are using infrared thermal imaging to census bats as they emerge nightly from caves, NEXRAD II Doppler radar to assess landscape patterns of nightly dispersal, and economic modeling to assess the impact that this insectivorous species has on a major agroecosystem in Texas.

    Contributor: Thomas Kunz 2010

  • These insectivorous species feed on a wide range of aerial insects, some of which are considered to be major agricultural pests, including corn earworms and cotton boleworms.

    Contributor: Thomas Kunz 2010

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