Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A gull-like bird (Fulmarus glacialis) of Arctic regions, having smoky gray plumage.
- n. Any of several similar or related birds.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Same as foulmart.
- n. A natatorial oceanic bird of the family Procellariidæ and genus Fulmarus or some closely related genus; the fulmar petrel. The common fulmar is Fulmarus glacialis, a bird as large as a medium-sized gull, and greatly resembling a herringgull in coloration, being white with a pearl-blue mantle and black tips on the primaries, but distinguished by the long tubular nostrils, which lie high upon the ridge of the upper mandible. It inhabits the northern seas in prodigious numbers, breeding in Iceland, Greenland, Spitzbergen, the Shetland and Orkney islands, the Hebrides, etc. It feeds on fish, the blubber of whales, and any fat, putrid, floating substance that comes in its way. It makes its nest on sea-cliffs, and lays only one egg. The natives of the island of St. Kilda, in the Hebrides, value the eggs above those of any other bird, and search for them by the most perilous descent of precipices by means of ropes. The fulmar is also valued for its feathers, its down, and the oil found in its stomach, which is one of the principal products of St. Kilda. When caught or assailed, it lightens itself by disgorging the oil from its stomach. There are several closely related species or varieties in the North Pacific. The slender-billed fulmar is Fulmarus tenuirostris or Thalassoica glacialoides, widely dispersed over the seas. The giant fulmar, Ossifraga gigantea, also called
bonebreaker , is a sooty-brown or fuliginous species, as large as a small albatross.
Wiktionary
- n. Either of two species of pelagic seabird, Fulmarus glacialis and F. glacialoides, which breed on cliffs.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. One of several species of sea birds, of the family
Procellariidæ , allied to the albatrosses and petrels. Among the well-known species are the arctic fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis) (called also fulmar petrel, malduck, and mollemock), and the giant fulmar (Ossifraga gigantea).
WordNet 3.0
- n. heavy short-tailed oceanic bird of polar regions
Etymologies
- Dialectal : probably Old Norse fūll, foul; see pū̆- in Indo-European roots + mār, mew; akin to Old English mǣw.
Examples
“To the distinguished ornithologist and broadcaster James Fisher, the fulmar was the nearest thing we had to an albatross in the North Atlantic.”
Telegraph.co.uk: news, business, sport, the Daily Telegraph newspaper, Sunday Telegraph
“Lagged effects of ocean climate change on fulmar population dynamics.”
“In addition, the Antarctic fulmar breeds on nearby islands and is regularly observed.”
“Additional immigrants from the north during the winter include many birds, such as thick-billed murre, northern fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis), and little auk.”
Fisheries and aquaculture in the Newfoundland and Labrador Seas, Northeastern Canada
“Some species characteristic of Marielandia are: southern fulmar (Fulmaras glacialoides); southern giant fulmar (Macronectes giganteus); cape pigeon (Daption capense); snow petrel (Pagodroma nivea);”
“At the far northern end of the beach we come across a dead fulmar and marvel at the size and ferocity of its beak.”
“He wrote a monograph on the fulmar and the still unsurpassed Shell Bird Book, a vade mecum of the cultural and natural history of British birds.”
“Large flocks of northern fulmar Fulmarus glacialis and gulls feed among the grounded icebergs.”
“His personal worst was a study on fulmar bird carcasses washed ashore on North Sea coastlines.”
“This includes the world's largest colony of northern gannet Morus bassanus - 60,428 pairs in 1999/2000, 23.6% of the northeastern Atlantic population; the largest and oldest British colony of northern fulmar Fulmaris glacialis (67,000 pairs); and 30% of the British population of the Atlantic puffin Fratercula arctica (135,732 pairs).”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘fulmar’.
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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