Advertisement

Advertisement

hoatzin

[ hoh-at-sin, waht-sin ]

noun

  1. a blue-faced, crested bird, Opisthocomus hoazin, of the Amazon and Orinoco forests, having as a nestling a large, temporary claw on the second and third digits of the forelimb, for climbing among the tree branches.


hoatzin

/ həʊˈætsɪn /

noun

  1. a unique South American gallinaceous bird, Opisthocomus hoazin, with a brownish plumage, a very small crested head, and clawed wing digits in the young: family Opisthocomidae
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


Discover More

Word History and Origins

Origin of hoatzin1

1655–65; Nahuatl huāctzīn, huāhtzīn name for several hen-sized birds of the Valley of Mexico, apparently applied indiscriminately by early naturalists to similar New World birds
Discover More

Word History and Origins

Origin of hoatzin1

C17: from American Spanish, from Nahuatl uatzin pheasant
Discover More

Example Sentences

The other tribe is represented by that strange bird the hoatzin of the Amazon.

But it is not nearly so long as in the hoatzin, and there is no terminal claw.

The flight of the hoatzin resembles that of an over-fed hen.

Such is the normal right destiny of a hoatzin chick, and the whee-og!

For the young hoatzin is hatched in a nursery—a crude nest of sticks—placed on the boughs of a tree overhanging the water.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement


hoatchinghoax