Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of several large, carrion-eating or predatory hawks of the subfamily Caracarinae, native to South and Central America and the southern United States.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The popular name of the hawks of the subfamily Polyborinæ and genera Polyborus, Phalcobænus, Senex, Milvago, Ibycter, and Daptrius, all of which are confined to America. The name is specially applicable to the species of Polyborus, of which there are several, as P. cherivay, P. auduboni, and P. lutosus, of the southern United States and warmer parts of America. These are large, vulture-like hawks, of terrestrial, ambulatory, not saltatory, habits, preying chiefly upon carrion. The head and neck are extensively denuded; the legs and wings are comparatively long; the beak is toothless, with the cere ending vertically, the nostrils high up, linear, and oblique, with concealed tubercle. Though vulturine in general aspect and economy, the caracaras approach the typical falcons in some anatomical characters, as in the peculiar structure of the shoulder-joint, the extensively ossified nasal bones with central nasal tubercle, and the anterior keel of the palate. The common caracara is much varied with white and black barring of the plumage, and is about 22 inches long. Also called
carcara and carrancha.
Wiktionary
- n. Any of several South American and Central American birds of prey in the family Falconidae.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Zoöl.) A south American bird of several species and genera, resembling both the eagles and the vultures. The caracaras act as scavengers, and are also called
carrion buzzards .
WordNet 3.0
- n. any of various long-legged carrion-eating hawks of South America and Central America
Etymologies
- Spanish or Portuguese, from Tupian, probably imitative. (Wiktionary)
- Spanish and Portuguese caracará, both from Tupi caracara. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Sometimes seen feeding alongside vultures at carcasses is the longer-necked and larger-headed crested caracara (Polyborus plancus), a hawk with distinctive markings.”
Did you know? Mexico's vultures have very different eating habits.
“The caracara doesn't only eat carrion but also catches lizards, insects, and other small prey.”
Did you know? Mexico's vultures have very different eating habits.
“One of the more descriptive common names for the crested caracara, incidentally, is the quebrantahuesos, literally the bone-smasher!”
Did you know? Mexico's vultures have very different eating habits.
“Directly in front of me a caracara bird chases a screaming penguin who scurries into a little hole beneath the tussock, safe.”
The Huffington Post: Margie Goldsmith: Traveling to the Falkland Islands: Sub-Antarctica
“There seem to be, however, a few near endemics such as two geese (Chloephaga hybrida and C. rubiceps), blackish cinclodes (Cinclodes antarcticus), black throated finch (Melanodera melanodera) and striated caracara (Phalcoboenus australis).”
“One of these EBAs, Guadalupe Island, is the native range of the Guadalupe junco (Junco insularis, CR) and the now extinct Guadalupe caracara (Polyborus lutosus) and Guadalupe storm-petrel, the latter last recorded in 1912.”
“I don't think Ushuaia has a metro, but it has a very fine dump for birding -- 3 species of caracara.”
“Three species are of particular concern: Great grebe (Podiceps gallardoi), with few than 5,000 individuals remaining, Ruddy-headed goose (Chloephaga rubidiceps), with a serious decline in population numbers, and Striated caracara (Phalcoboenus australis), whose numbers have declined due to hunting.”
“He knows a forest falcon from a caracara, a hoatzin from a sunbittern, and one species of antshrike from another.”
“Around the next bend in the river we came upon a red caracara perched on a branch.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘caracara’.
-
Visuals
A list of words which yield surprising, beautiful, amusing, or otherwise noteworthy images here on Wordnik.
photochrom, fufluns, thank you, cool l..., postcard, picture postcard, cricket, physiological ill..., Gakuryū Ishii, ametropia, One Froggy Evening, rhodopsin, Santiago Calatrava and 636 more...
-
birds
birds with singular names from
at least 9 English dictionariesaasvogel, aberdevine, accentor, accipiter, aepyornis, agami, albatross, alcatras, alcid, alcidine, amadavat, amokura and 1056 more...
-
Reduples
Go for it, brothers and sisters! I personally have been suffering long for lack of an open reduplicatives list
happy clappy, bribble-brabble, diddle-daddle, hugger-mugger, kikiriki, Bora-Bora, mahi-mahi, jingle-jangle, knick-knack paddy..., chit-chat, bon-bon, clapperclaw and 292 more...
-
Car- Trouble
career, careen, carom, carnage, cartwheeling, carter, caribou, carabiner, caracara, caracole, carafe, carageenan and 29 more...
-
More Bird Wirds: North America
Birds endemic to the United States and/or North America.
toucan, peacock, weaver, bullfinch, redpoll, siskin, crossbill, finch, rosy-finch, oriole, cowbird, blackbird and 213 more...
-
The Aubrey/Maturin List I'm Gonna Mak...
I'm wading through Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin novels one by one, and someday, I'll wade through them again and list all the words I learned while reading them.
Edit: I started ma...studdingsail, carronade, mumchance, grumlin-futtocks, crosscat-harpings, holystone, sennit, orlop, orchitis, negus, kevel, altumal and 1112 more...
-
Monovocalics
Words that have only one of the vowels. On this list I include only words with at least three vowels. When I first started the list, if a word had several forms, I generally listed only the one wit...
syzygy, mirific, cumulus, homolog, monocot, bedewed, jezebel, referee, bikini, minikin, locomotor, terebenthene and 2359 more...
-
looked up
Words I've come across while reading and looked up in the dictionary.
deesis, pendentive, revetment, aedicule, stemma, patera, ephod, entrepot, corbel, exedra, volute, archivolt and 1408 more...
-
Peregrinatio
words of pilgrimage in the Celtic tradition
peregrinari pro Dei amore
many from Thomas Merton's 'Mystics and Zen Masters'pergrini, St. Columba, St. Cadroe, eulogiae, Aetheria, martyrium, St. Brendan, relegatio in insulam, Le Puy, Compostela, Rocamadour, Ponce de Leras and 19 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for caracara.

knitandpurl "Hawks and larks dart past tamaracks, as jackdaws and mallards flap past catalpas and land athwart a larch (sparhawks and caracaras scrawk at blackcaps and avadavats)."
Eunoia by Christian Bök (upgraded edition), p 27 May 19, 2010
chained_bear "'I have seen a little flock of white-winged finches and a bird I took to be a mountain caracara.'"
--P. O'Brian, The Wine-Dark Sea, 210 Mar 16, 2008