waterfowl

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. Any of the birds, such as ducks, geese and swans, that spend most of their non-flying time on water; especially those of the family Anatidae.

Pronunciation

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-waterfowl.wav

Word forms

waterfowl waterfowls

Etymology

From Middle English waterfoul, water-foul, equivalent to water + fowl. Compare Old English dopfugel (“waterfowl, moorhen”, literally “dipping-fowl”).

This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.