grouse
part of speech
noun (a grouse, grouse — bird; a grouse, grouses — complaint); verb (grouse, grouses, groused, grousing); adjective (grouse — Australia, slang)
meaning for a pupil
1) A grouse is a plump, brown wild bird with feathered legs that lives on moors and in forests. tree →
2) (informal) To grouse means to complain or grumble, and a grouse is a complaint. tree →
3) (Australia, NZ, slang) Grouse means really good or excellent. tree →
sense in the lessons
In science and geography lessons, red grouse live on heather moors in Scotland and northern England; in North America there are ruffed grouse and sage grouse. Grouse shooting is a sport in the UK, which some people oppose. In everyday talk, a person who grouses is always moaning. In Australia, «that's grouse!» means «that's great!» (a bit old-fashioned now).
examples
- A grouse flew up from the heather. tree →
- Red grouse live on the moors of Scotland. tree →
- The male sage grouse puffs up its chest to show off. tree →
- Stop grousing about the rain and put your coat on. tree →
- My only grouse is that the film was too long. tree →
- (Australia) That pie was grouse, mate! tree →
- Grouse are hard to see because their feathers match the moor. tree →
- Thus spoke the grouse, who certainly had very pretty manners. tree →
note
For the bird, the plural is usually also «grouse»: «three grouse». For the complaint, the plural is «grouses». The Australian slang «grouse» (good) is the opposite of the complaining sense, so listen to context.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «grouse» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.