Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Western US A deep gulch or ravine with sloping sides, often dry in summer.
- noun A streambed, often dry according to the season.
- noun A small stream, bayou, or canal.
- noun Upper Midwest A valley with hills on either side.
- noun A stream of molten lava.
- noun A sheet of solidified lava.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A dry ravine or gulch; a channel worn by running water in times of excessive rainfall or by the sudden melting of the snow.
- noun A flow: used principally, by some geologists, of lava-flows.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Geol.) A stream.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A stream.
- noun geology A lava flow.
- noun US A deep
gulch orravine , frequently dry insummer .
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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I wondered about the word coulee in the old song: "... they feed in the coulees and water in the draws ..."
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The cowpunchers pays 'em an afternoon call, an 'suggests that the air outside the coulee is a lot healthier for sheep -- an' sheepmen -- an 'that onless they makes up their minds to depart, an' to make that departure a record-breaker for speed, they'll make their relatives sure a heap mournful.
The Boy With the U. S. Foresters Francis Rolt-Wheeler 1918
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"Now, this coulee, which is the scene of these here operations, is so located that there's only one way out.
The Boy With the U. S. Foresters Francis Rolt-Wheeler 1918
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I think the longest shot I've ever taken was about 250 yards (across a deep coulee) I got the mule deer buck and filled my tag.
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This year I took an offhand shot at a standing mule deer doe in Montana, and missed completely, about 200 yards (another coulee, terrain prevented any kind of a rest).
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This year I took an offhand shot at a standing mule deer doe in Montana, and missed completely, about 200 yards (another coulee, terrain prevented any kind of a rest).
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I think the longest shot I've ever taken was about 250 yards (across a deep coulee) I got the mule deer buck and filled my tag.
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She and others believe improving the coulee would prevent a wall of water from rushing downstream.
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She and others believe improving the coulee would prevent a wall of water from rushing downstream.
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She and others believe improving the coulee would prevent a wall of water from rushing downstream.
fbharjo commented on the word coulee
the strain of rain
December 2, 2008
paulmorris commented on the word coulee
In the Northwest U.S. a coulee is a gulch carved out of basalt rock by the great Missoula Floods: A dry canyon eroded by Pleistocene floods that cut into the lava beds of the Columbia Plateau in the western United States. These coulees have steep sides and never were stream beds. The Grand Coulee in Eastern Washington State is the largest and best known.
April 8, 2009
chained_bear commented on the word coulee
"He heads off down a small coulee, staying hidden until he is on the far side of the cattle, trots right to pull in the herd, back left to tighten the flank, and moves in expertly from behind to push them forward. More than a hundred and fifty years of inventive selective breeding has created the perfect cowpoke on four legs. Gary watches his partner at work, always amazed that a dog with no formal training knows instinctively from an early age exactly what has to be done."
—Merrily Weisbord and Kim Kachanoff, Dogs with Jobs: Working Dogs Around the World (NY and London: Pocket Books, 2000), 98
July 28, 2009