Definitions

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

  • adjective Having sediment or foreign particles stirred up or suspended; muddy.
  • adjective Heavy, dark, or dense, as smoke or fog.
  • adjective In a state of turmoil; muddled.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Properly, having the lees disturbed; in a more general sense, muddy; foul with extraneous matter; thick; not clear; used of liquids of any kind, or of color.
  • Confused; disordered; disquieted; disturbed.

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

  • adjective Not clear; having suspended matter that scatters light passing through; having the lees or sediment disturbed; roiled; muddy; thick; -- used of liquids of any kind
  • adjective Disturbed; confused; disordered.

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

  • adjective Having the lees or sediment disturbed; roiled; muddy; thick; not clear; -- used of liquids of any kind.

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

  • adjective (of liquids) clouded as with sediment

Etymologies

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

[Latin turbidus, disordered, from turba, turmoil, probably from Greek turbē.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin turbidus ("disturbed"), from turba ("mass, throng, crowd, tumult, disturbance").

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Examples

  • To unite a killer mix of artificial and live bait — giving a larger, bulkier target in turbid waters — hook a minnow in the head on the middle treble, adding a treble stinger if strikes are short, and drop it to the bottom.

    25 Killer Spring Tips for Bass, Trout, Crappie, Walleys, and Pike 2005

  • This adaptation allows the fish to live in turbid, stagnant waters low in dissolved oxygen: under such conditions, it may obtain as much as 70 percent of the oxygen it needs from the atmosphere.

    Fun Facts About Alligator Gar 2005

  • Weary of waiting longer for the weather, we start at last on a somewhat doubtful morning, and find the paths wet and slippery, and the mountain streams all turbid from the rain of the last three days.

    Untrodden Peaks and Unfrequented Valleys 1873

  • ; the river raced in turbid waves; the sand drove in clouds; and the face of the sky was darkened as if by a London fog.

    A Thousand Miles Up the Nile 1891

  • Flies: The traditional advice is to use black in turbid water and light colors in clear water, but I’ve always had better results with darker flies — black, green, and brown.

    Catch Big Trout Against Cutbanks With Big Wet Flies 2009

  • “Match the hue to the water conditions: black in turbid water, bright colors in stained, and silver in clear, for example. “

    Use a Double-Bladed Bucktail for Monster Muskies 2008

  • Let us carry our experiments a step further, and see what effect what is known as a turbid medium has upon the illuminating value of different parts of the spectrum.

    Scientific American Supplement, No. 595, May 28, 1887 Various

  • Richard Lenski (concerning turbidity), and then search the pdf for "turbid" for me to observe that the actual data are not there.

    Conservapedia - Recent changes [en] Aschlafly 2010

  • Richard Lenski (concerning turbidity), and then search the pdf for "turbid" for me to observe that the actual data are not there.

    Conservapedia - Recent changes [en] RichardKerry 2010

  • Richard Lenski (concerning turbidity), and then search the pdf for "turbid" for me to observe that the actual data are not there.

    Conservapedia - Recent changes [en] PRichards 2010

Comments

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  • ". . .a bow window of milky-murky glass giving off a dark and turbid glow, a pallid photocopy of sunlight. . ." Gilbert Adair translation of Georges Perec's La Disparition

    August 11, 2010