Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of several small shorebirds of the genus Phalaropus, having lobed toes and characteristically feeding by spinning in small circles in the water and catching small invertebrates brought to the surface by this motion.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A small wading bird of the family Phalaropodidæ, having lobate toes.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Zoöl.) Any species of Phalaropus and allied genera of small wading birds (Grallæ), having lobate toes. They are often seen far from land, swimming in large flocks. Called also
sea goose .
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Any of three small
wading birds in thegenus Phalaropus , of the familyScolopacidae , that havelobed toes .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun small sandpiper-like shorebird having lobate toes and being good swimmers; breed in the Arctic and winter in the tropics
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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The flesh of the phalarope is a great delicacy, like that of other waders which occur in the regions in question, but which I cannot now stay to describe.
The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II Alexander Leslie 1866
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In our June heatwave, the very rare female red-necked phalarope was sighted in the midlands, bringing crowds of watchers.
Country diary: The Burren Sarah Poyntz 2010
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Representative species include snow, Brant and Canada goose; yellow-billed, Arctic, and red-throated loons; whistling swans; oldsquaw ducks; gyrfalcons; willow and rock ptarmigan; red-necked phalarope; parasitic jaeger; snowy owls; hoary redpoll and snow bunting.
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The red-throated diver Gavia stellata, great northern diver Gavia immer, mallard Anas platyrhynchos, long-tailed duck Clangula hyemalis, rednecked phalarope Phalaropus lobatus and the purple sandpiper Calidris maritima are believed to nest in the area, but at present no information is available to confirm this.
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Other shorebirds that eat leaf-beetles are the Wilson phalarope and dowitcher.
Our Vanishing Wild Life Its Extermination and Preservation William Temple Hornaday 1895
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Wireworms and their adult forms, click beetles, are devoured by the northern phalarope, woodcock, jacksnipe, pectoral sandpiper, killdeer, and upland plover.
Our Vanishing Wild Life Its Extermination and Preservation William Temple Hornaday 1895
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Such are the dotterel (Eudromias morinellus), several species of phalarope, an
Darwinism (1889) Alfred Russel Wallace 1868
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The most striking example is that of the gray phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius).
Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection A Series of Essays Alfred Russel Wallace 1868
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Of birds the phalarope was still the most common species, especially at sea, where in flocks of six or seven it swam incessantly backwards and forwards between the pieces of ice.
The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II Alexander Leslie 1866
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Zemlya, though there has hitherto been observed there only the nearly allied _smalnaebbade simsnaeppan_, the red-necked phalarope
The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II Alexander Leslie 1866
fbharjo commented on the word phalarope
phalarope used in the sense of "having a white spot" from the greek root
January 16, 2007