bobtail
Americanadjective
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Also bobtailed having a bobtail.
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cut short; docked; cropped.
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shorter or briefer than usual; abbreviated.
Several legislative items must be dropped from the current bobtail session of Congress.
verb (used with object)
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bobtails,
present (3rd person singular)
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bobtailed,
past participle, past
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bobtailing
present participle
noun
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a docked or diminutive tail
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an animal with such a tail
adjective
verb
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to dock the tail of
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to cut short; curtail
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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bobtailsimple
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bobtailssimple
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have bobtailedperfect
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has bobtailedperfect
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am bobtailingprogressive
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are bobtailingprogressive
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is bobtailingprogressive
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have been bobtailingperfect progressive
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has been bobtailingperfect progressive
Past
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bobtailedsimple
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had bobtailedperfect
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was bobtailingprogressive
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were bobtailingprogressive
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had been bobtailingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bobtail
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:
He drives a bobtail truck moving furniture across Southern California.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 5, 2024
It was a large, robust cat about the size of a jaguar, with an elongated face, lanky front legs, and a sloping back that ended in a bobtail.
From Science Daily ● May 30, 2024
Crook’s group has been comparing several painkillers in bobtail squid, but Crook says that they haven’t had much luck figuring out which drugs are the most effective, despite testing hundreds of animals.
From Scientific American ● Sep. 20, 2023
Research will shift from the day octopus to the Hawaiian bobtail squid, which is unregulated.
From Washington Times ● Feb. 16, 2023
This one was almost twice as large, chunky and heavy, with a short bobtail and thick furry legs.
From "The Incredible Journey" by Sheila Burnford
That’s what father always says to visitors who bring bobtails and chokers.
From Three Boys or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai by George Manville Fenn
Folks ain't got no right to censuah othah folks about dey habits; Him dat giv' de squir'ls de bushtails made de bobtails fu' de rabbits.
From The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar by William Dean Howells
The wonderful Wizard had asked to join the party, and with him came his friend the Shaggy Man, who was shaggy but not ragged, being dressed in fine silks with satin shags and bobtails.
From The Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum
I’ve little time to lose: I’m getting old— Stiff-jointed in my wits, that once were nimble As a ferret among the bobtails, old and dull.
From Krindlesyke by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
Sometimes he calls the Academicians, "Sons of Canvas;" sometimes "Tagrags and bobtails of the sacred brush."
From History of English Humour, Vol. 2 by Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
In the house a bobtailed cat prowls the kitchen counter while Trigger, the pet guinea pig, snoozes in its cage.
From Time Magazine Archive
If it does, there will be problems worse than the possibility of a bobtailed Olympics.
From Time Magazine Archive
Suddenly, a rabbit bounded out of a nearby hole and fled across the heather in a series of bobtailed bounces, heading straight for a patch of scrub fir trees.
From Time Magazine Archive
McClean now had two American tiny-tub artists to beat, and earlier this month he succeeded, despite a broken mast in the Bay of Biscay, reaching Portugal in the bobtailed Giltspur, now a mere 7 ft.
From Time Magazine Archive
He was a tall, ungainly-looking countryman, dressed in a blue bobtailed coat with white metal buttons, white duck trousers, heavy blucher boots, and a top hat and white gloves.
From Rambling Recollections of Chelsea by an old inhabitant by J. B. Ellenor
Other terms that will prove catnip for lovers of professional slang: bobtailing, deadheading, lollipops.
From New York Times ● May 31, 2017
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.
