rabbitfish
Americannoun
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a puffer, Lagocephalus laevigatus.
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a chimaera, Chimaera monstrosa.
noun
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a large chimaera, Chimaera monstrosa , common in European seas, with separate caudal and anal fins and a long whiplike tail
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any of the spiny-finned tropical marine fishes of the family Siganidae of Indo-Pacific waters. They have a rabbit-like snout and spines on the pelvic or ventral fins
Etymology
Origin of rabbitfish
1820–30; rabbit + fish, from the resemblance of its nose to a rabbit's
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.
The bright yellow rabbitfish, for example, overgrazes seagrass beds, destroying plants that provide a key habitat for local species and sequester carbon.
From Reuters • Nov. 13, 2022
They can avoid overfishing key herbivores like the rabbitfish that nurture the reefs by clearing away excessive algae.
From New York Times • Jan. 4, 2018
This seaweed is so nasty, in fact, that most marine herbivores avoid it on sight—except for one species of rabbitfish that quivers with excitement every time it spots this not-so-common algae.
From Science Magazine • Oct. 17, 2011
If Fijians developed a particular taste for that one rabbitfish, for instance, turtle weed might begin to grow out of control, launching its bid for world, or at least South Pacific, domination.
From Science Magazine • Oct. 17, 2011
Pretty much the only things that live there are rabbitfish and ponyfish, acorn barnacles, green-lipped mussels, and bacteria.
From Time Magazine Archive
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.
