sand grouse

or sand·grouse

noun

any of several birds of the family Pteroclididae inhabiting sandy areas of the Old World, resembling both pigeons and shorebirds and having precocial young.

Nearby words

sand dab, sand dollar, sand eel, sand flea, sand fly, sand grouse, sand hopper, sand jack, sand lance, sand leek, sand lily

Origin of sand grouse

First recorded in 1775–85

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for sandgrouse

Sandgrouse were few, but commoner towards the central plateau, where were water-holes.
The Leicestershires beyond Baghdad|Edward John Thompson
In pigeons and sandgrouse there is no vomer, but the other bones have the Schizognathous arrangement.
The Vertebrate Skeleton|Sidney H. Reynolds
Of game-birds the most plentiful are sandgrouse, quail (a bird of passage) and snipe.
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 9, Slice 1|Various

British Dictionary definitions for sandgrouse

sandgrouse

/ (ˈsændˌɡraʊs) /

noun

any bird of the family Pteroclididae, of dry regions of the Old World, having very short feet, a short bill, and long pointed wings and tail: order Columbiformes

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