Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of various Eurasian birds of the family Muscicapidae that feed on insects, usually catching the insects in flight.
- n. Any of various similar American birds of the family Tyrannidae. Also called tyrant flycatcher.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. One who or that which catches or entraps flies or other winged insects.
- n. Specifically, a bird which habitually pursues and captures insects on the wing. Any species of the old-world family Muscicapidæ, a large group of oscine passerine birds having a flattened bill garnished with rictal bristles. The species and genera are very numerous, and the limits of the family are not fixed. Among the best-known species are the spotted flycatcher, Muscicapa grisola, and the pied flycatcher, M. atricapilla.
Wiktionary
- n. Any of several birds, of the families Muscicapidae (in Europe and Asia) and Tyrannidae (in the Americas), that catch insects in flight.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Zoöl.) One of numerous species of birds that feed upon insects, which they take on the wing.
WordNet 3.0
- n. large American birds that characteristically catch insects on the wing
- n. any of a large group of small songbirds that feed on insects taken on the wing
Etymologies
- fly + catcher (Wiktionary)
Examples
“Sure, some birds have names that describe their activities, such as flycatcher, or gnatcatcher, or their general appearance, such as bluebird, or the place they tend to loiter, such as cowbird.”
“A short distance up the cañon of the west branch of Clear Creek, a new kind of flycatcher was first heard, and presently seen with my glass.”
“I have to admit that I don’t know what kind of flycatcher they are although they’ve raised many clutches either on the shutter or in a nest a foot away from the back door.”
“It turns out that a charismatic endangered bird — the southwestern willow flycatcher — is known to nest in the offending shrubs.”
“Last March, the Center for Biological Diversity sued the government, charging that indiscriminately killing tamarisks jeopardizes the flycatcher”
“Scissor-tailed flycatcher, Tyrannus forficatus fomerly, Milvulus forficatus; protonym, Muscivora forficata, also known as the Texas bird-of-paradise and the swallow-tailed flycatcher, photographed at Manhattan, Kansas.”
The Guardian: Mystery bird: scissor-tailed flycatcher, Tyrannus forficatus
“Response: This is an adult scissor-tailed flycatcher, Tyrannus forficatus, a member of the genus Tyrannus, so named for their pugnacious nature when defending their territories against marauding crows and other, even larger, predators.”
The Guardian: Mystery bird: scissor-tailed flycatcher, Tyrannus forficatus
“For 20 minutes, we stood by a swampy pond, trying to home in on a small fluttering piratic flycatcher in the brambles.”
“The Act is responsible for saving bald eagles, peregrine falcons and American alligators and is in the process of saving many others, including polar bears, the gray wolf, the southwestern willow flycatcher and the extremely rare Miami blue butterfly.”
The Huffington Post: Kieran Suckling: Latest ESA Success: The Return of a Once-rare Snake
“Similarly, Glamorgan's second Championship side 21 years later had ace flycatcher Peter Walker 2010's president flanked by those two faultlessly infallible snafflers Bryan and Roger Davis.”
The Guardian: Madcap Wilf Wooller created my Glamorgan angst | Frank Keating
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘flycatcher’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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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...
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Genes
Interesting gene names. Some of these may have changed recently (to something less offensive/funny).
http://www.genenames.org/
tinman, agnostic, dreadlocks, Van Gogh, fruitless, lava lamp, ariadne, cheap date, ken and barbie, I'm not dead yet, I'm not dead yet 2, manic fringe and 1192 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...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for flycatcher.
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