thick-knee

American  

[thik-nee] / ˈθɪkˌni /

noun

1. any of several crepuscular or nocturnal wading birds of the family Burhinidae, of the Old World and tropical America, having a thickened joint between the femoral and tibiotarsal bones.

---

thick-knee British  

noun

1. another name for stone curlew

---

Etymology

Origin of thick-knee

First recorded in 1810–20

Example Sentences

Its residents include the threatened Egyptian fruit bat, the bee orchid and the Eurasian Thick-knee, a dwindling species of shorebird also known as a stone-curlew.

From Washington Times

The curlew of inlanders, or stone-curlew—called also, by some writers, from its stronghold in England, the Norfolk plover, and sometimes the thick-knee—is usually classed among the Charadriidae, but it offers several remarkable differences from the more normal plovers.

From Project Gutenberg

The bill is short, blunt, and stout; the head large, broad, and flat at the top; the wings and legs long—the latter presenting the peculiarity of a singular enlargement of the upper part of the tarsus, whence the names Oedicnemus and Thick-knee have been conferred.

From Project Gutenberg

It is also called Thick-knee, from the robust conformation of this joint; and Stone Curlew, from its frequenting waste stony places and uttering a note which has been compared to the sound of the syllables curlui or turlui.

From Project Gutenberg

By day the Thick-knee confines itself to the ground, either crouching or hunting for food, which consists of worms, slugs, and beetles, under stones, which it is taught by its instinct to turn over.

From Project Gutenberg