Definitions

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

  • noun Any of several seabirds of the genus Fratercula of northern regions, characteristically having black-and-white plumage and a vertically flattened, triangular bill that is brightly colored during breeding season.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A name wrongly applied to the Manx shearwater, Puffinus anglorum.
  • noun A sea-parrot, colter-neb, or bottle-nosed auk; a bird of the family Alcidæ and genus Fratercula or Lunda. See these words.
  • noun A kind of fungus; a fuzzball; a puffball.
  • noun of the

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

  • noun (Zoöl.) An arctic sea bird Fratercula arctica) allied to the auks, and having a short, thick, swollen beak, whence the name; -- called also bottle nose, cockandy, coulterneb, marrot, mormon, pope, and sea parrot.
  • noun the Manx shearwater. See under Manx.
  • noun (Bot.) The puffball.
  • noun obsolete A sort of apple.

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

  • noun any of two genera of northern seabirds having short necks and brightly colored compressed bills

Etymologies

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

[Middle English poffoun, puffon, perhaps from puf, puff; see puff.]

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Examples

  • (Plush animals, among which the puffin is the cutest, come with a $50 donation and up.)

    'Adopt' Your Favorite Animal On Facebook Siel Ju 2010

  • That's why the cost of adopting a cute little puffin is the same as adopting larger, perhaps less cute, animals.

    'Adopt' Your Favorite Animal On Facebook Siel Ju 2010

  • At its most bad ass, “Puffin” brings cheesepuffs to mind yes, I know a puffin is a bird.

    2010: All the Future is Cracked Up to Be? - Pink Raygun.com 2010

  • Given the frequent Arctic references it the article should be referred to as a puffin piece.

    Boston Globe on Ray Bradley « Climate Audit 2005

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Collected Works of W. B. Yeats Volume III Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Collected Works of W. B. Yeats Volume III Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Collected Works of W. B. Yeats Volume III Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Collected Works of W. B. Yeats Volume III Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

  • Once I smelled new-mown hay when we were quite a long way from land, and once when I was watching the sea-parrots as the sailors call the puffin I noticed they had different ways of tucking their heads under their wings, or I fancied it, and said to the captain, ‘They have different characters’.

    Autobiographies W.B. Yeats 1965

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