BUTCHERBIRD • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Butcherbird

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noun

butcherbird, butcher-bird, butcher bird n.

(Zool.) Any species of shrike of the genus Lanius, so called because they impale their prey on thorns.

(Zool.) Large carnivorous Australian bird with the shrikelike habit of impaling prey on thorns. Note: The Lanius excubitor is the common butcher bird of Europe. In England, the bearded tit is sometimes called the lesser butcher bird. The American species are Lanius borealis, or northern butcher bird, and Lanius Ludovicianus or loggerhead shrike. The name butcher bird is derived from its habit of suspending its prey impaled upon thorns, after killing it.

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Etymology of 'Butcherbird'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Butcherbird" Quotes from Famous Books

... as a Vitellite—what a name of hungry omen for the imperial devourer!—plausibly insinuates man to be "a cooking animal." Who can gainsay it? and wherewithal, but with domesticated monkeys, does he share this happy attribute? It is true, the butcher-bird spits his prey on a thorn, the slow epicurean boa glazes his mashed antelope, the king of vultures quietly waits for a gamey taste and the rapid roasting of the tropics: but all this care, all this caloric, cannot be accounted culinary, and without a question, the kitchen is ...

— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... BUTCHER-BIRD (Lanius collurio).—Said to have been seen at Otterbourne. A slug has been found impaled on a thorn, but whether this was the shrike's larder, or as a charm for ...

— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge

... step to his house that he may alight in comfort; the way is not made clear for him that he may start straight for the flowers, nor are any sown for him. He has no shelter if the storm descends suddenly; he has no dome of twisted straw well thatched and tiled to retreat to. The butcher-bird, with a beak like a crooked iron nail, drives him to the ground, and leaves him pierced with a thorn; but no hail of shot revenges his tortures. The grass stiffens at nightfall (in autumn), and ...

— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies

Words linked to "Butcherbird" : shrike, white-rumped shrike, genus Lanius, Australian magpie, Lanius excubitor, Cracticus, northern shrike, Lanius borealis, Lanius ludovicianus excubitorides, Lanius, genus Cracticus