calve
Americanverb (used without object)
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calves,
present (3rd person singular)
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calved,
past participle, past
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calving
present participle
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to give birth to a calf.
The cow is expected to calve tomorrow.
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(of a glacier, an iceberg, etc.) to break up or splinter so as to produce a detached piece.
verb (used with object)
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calves,
present (3rd person singular)
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calved,
past participle, past
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calving
present participle
-
to give birth to (a calf ).
-
(of a glacier, an iceberg, etc.) to break off or detach (a piece).
The glacier calved an iceberg.
verb
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to give birth to (a calf)
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(of a glacier or iceberg) to release (masses of ice) in breaking up
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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calvesimple
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calvessimple
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have calvedperfect
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has calvedperfect
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am calvingprogressive
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are calvingprogressive
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is calvingprogressive
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have been calvingperfect progressive
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has been calvingperfect progressive
Past
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calvedsimple
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had calvedperfect
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was calvingprogressive
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were calvingprogressive
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had been calvingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of calve
before 1000; Middle English calven, Old English (Anglian) *calfian, derivative of calf calf 1; cognate with Old English ( West Saxon ) cealfian
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The whales feast all summer long, and only then embark on a 6,000-mile journey south to Mexico, where females calve and nurse their young in the warm and protected inlets along the Baja Peninsula.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 14, 2024
As they seep and calve into the sea, melting glaciers and ice sheets are raising global water levels at unprecedented rates.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 3, 2024
These icebergs, some of them skyscraper-size, calve regularly from the glacier front, crash into a deep fiord and float west into Disko Bay.
From New York Times ● Jan. 6, 2024
They breed and calve in waters off Costa Rica, Guatemala and other Central American countries.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 4, 2023
There were three calves born when they corralled them, and two of the cows looked as if they would calve within a few days.
From "Ceremony:" by Leslie Marmon Silko
"I had cows and calves that I wanted to sell and trade was very good at that time," he told BBC News NI.
From BBC ● Aug. 2, 2026
And pulsing is no joke — one exercise left my calves shaking.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
“It couldn’t come at a worse time, as a lot of producers will be selling their calves over the next few months.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026
"Orcas often tear apart prey and share it with other members of the group, including calves and juveniles," said Ayres.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 23, 2026
Mattie and Chase followed behind like calves, distracted by this butterfly or that bug or newly bloomed lily.
From "Hattie Big Sky" by Kirby Larson
The size and makeup of the particles also revealed that the main source of iron was not dust, but icebergs calved from West Antarctica.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 4, 2026
The icebergs are comparable in size to some of the smaller icebergs found off present-day Antarctica, such as blocks that calved from the Larsen B ice shelf in 2002.
From BBC ● Apr. 24, 2025
“We’ve had some pretty major erosion at archaeological sites of serious concern — we go out after storm events and sometimes see multiple feet of erosion, big chunks that have calved off at once.”
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 28, 2023
I grew up reading Scott's journals, I traced routes from Palmer Station to Queen Maude Land on a map, and I stared for hours at photographs of calved glaciers in the Minnesota Science Museum.
From Salon ● May 29, 2023
‘I don’t know. They said I could summon them when the time comes. Maybe Artemis and Apollo can explain -’ A section of the wall calved like a glacier.
From "Blood of Olympus" by Rick Riordan
The leading causes of cattle death are respiratory illness, digestive problems, calving complications and weather—not wolves.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026
The Mexican cowboys became adept at everything from calving to branding to overseeing the kind of long-distance cattle drives that later became a staple of the western.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 23, 2026
"She had an easy calving, the vet said the calves were easy to get out, it was just the stress of carrying so many calves."
From BBC ● Jan. 9, 2026
Don’t forget Canada’s zombie wildfires, the Texas floods, the late autumn Southwest heat waves, the calving Doomsday glacier and on and on.
From Salon ● Dec. 31, 2025
It was like seeing glaciers calving, or moths bursting out of their cocoons.
From "The School for Whatnots" by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
