whiskers

«whiskers» in Mova's school dictionary: the long, stiff hairs that grow near the mouth and nose… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 5 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

noun (whiskers — plural; one whisker)

meaning for a pupil

1) Whiskers are the long, stiff hairs that grow near the mouth and nose of animals such as cats, dogs, mice and seals, used for feeling things around them. tree →

2) Whiskers can also mean the hair growing on a man's face. tree →

3) «By a whisker» means by a tiny amount: «we won by a whisker». tree →

sense in the lessons

In science lessons whiskers are a sense adaptation: a cat's whiskers feel tiny movements in the air and help it judge whether it can fit through a gap; seals use whiskers to find fish in murky water. In everyday talk «by a whisker» means only just. In stories, characters may stroke their whiskers when thinking.

examples

• The cat's whiskers twitched when it heard the mouse. tree →
• Cats use their whiskers to feel if they fit through a gap. tree →
• Seals find fish with their whiskers. tree →
• Grandad's whiskers tickled when he kissed me. tree →
• We won the race by a whisker. tree →
• Never cut a cat's whiskers. tree →
• The mouse had long whiskers and a pink nose. tree →
• The Cat was laughing also, but tried to hide it by stroking his long whiskers. tree →

note

Usually plural «whiskers»; singular «a whisker». Whiskers are not just decoration — cutting them can confuse an animal. «The cat's whiskers» (old-fashioned slang) means something excellent.

In the corpora

• Seal whiskers are so sensitive that a blindfolded seal followed a fish's water trail that was more than 30 seconds old.
• Walruses find clams on the dark seabed with hundreds of sensitive whiskers and suck them out of their shells.
• A sturgeon has five rows of bony plates along its body and four whiskers under its snout to feel for food.
• Off with his whiskers!» (collar = grab), and by the time the court settles, the cook has gone.
• Something small and bright twinkles inside it, and a face grows round it: brown and small, with whiskers.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «whiskers» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.