Definitions

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

  • noun Any of several small dabbling ducks, chiefly of the genus Anas, often having brightly marked plumage.
  • noun A moderate or dark bluish green to greenish blue.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A small fresh-water duck, of the subfamily Anatinæ and genus Querquedula (or Nettion).
  • noun The blue-winged teal.
  • noun The act of cajoling or wheedling.
  • noun A Welsh dry measure, equal to five Winchester bushels (nearly). A long teal in Pembrokeshire is about eight bushels.

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

  • noun (Zoöl.) Any one of several species of small fresh-water ducks of the genus Anas and the subgenera Querquedula and Nettion. The male is handsomely colored, and has a bright green or blue speculum on the wings.
  • noun a goslet. See Goslet.
  • noun the common European teal.

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

  • noun Any of various small freshwater ducks of the genus Anas that are brightly coloured and have short necks.
  • noun colour A dark, somewhat bluish-green colour; a dark cyan.
  • adjective colour having a bluish-green colour

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

  • noun a blue-green color or pigment
  • noun any of various small short-necked dabbling river ducks of Europe and America
  • adjective of a bluish shade of green

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English tele.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Probably from an unrecorded Old English word cognate with Middle Dutch teling ("teal") Middle Low German telink, from West Germanic *taili. As the name of a shade of dark greenish-blue like the color patterns on the fowl's head and wings, it is attested from 1923.

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