fish Hear it!

fish Definition

fish (fis̸h)

noun pl. fish, fish′es

  1. any of three classes (jawless, cartilaginous, and bony fishes) of coldblooded vertebrate animals living in water and having fins, permanent gills for breathing, and, usually, scales
  2. loosely any animal living in water only, as a dolphin, crab, or oyster: often used in combination shellfish, jellyfish
  3. the flesh of a fish used as food
  4. Informal a person thought of as like a fish in being easily lured by bait, lacking intelligence or emotion, etc.

Etymology: ME < OE fisc, akin to Ger fisch, Du visch < IE base *pisk- > L piscis

intransitive verb

  1. to catch or try to catch fish, or shrimps, lobsters, etc.
  2. to try to get something indirectly or by cunning: often with for
  3. to grope: often with for

Etymology: OE fiscian

transitive verb

  1. to catch or try to catch fish, shrimps, etc. in to fish a stream
  2. to get by or as by fishing
  3. to grope for, find, and bring to view: often with out or up to fish a coin from one's pocket
  4. Naut. to pull (an old-fashioned anchor) to the gunwale, as from the cathead, preparatory to securing it

adjective

  1. of fish or fishing
  2. selling fish

fish Related Forms
fish′·able adjective fish′·like′ adjective
fish Idioms

drink like a fish

to drink heavily, esp. alcoholic liquor

fish in troubled waters

to try to gain something by taking advantage of a confused or troubled situation

fish or cut bait

to proceed energetically with a task or give it up altogether

fish out

to deplete the stock of fish in (a lake, etc.)

like a fish out of water

out of one's element; in surroundings not suited to one

neither fish, flesh, nor fowl

not belonging to a district or recognizable category or class

other fish to fry

other, more important things to attend to

the Fishes

Pisces, the constellation and twelfth sign of the zodiac

Fish Definition

Fish (fis̸h)

Fish, Hamilton 1808-93; U.S. statesman

fish Synonyms

fish

n.

piscis (Latin), seafood, panfish, denizen of the deep, finny prey, one of the finny tribe. see also bass, clam, lobster, oyster, shrimp, trout, turtle, whale 1.

Types of fish include: catfish, pickerel, pike, perch, trout, flounder, sucker, sunfish, bass, crappy, bream, sole, turbot, mackerel, cod, horse mackerel, salmon, carp, minnow, porgy, eel, bullhead, hogfish, blenny, blindfish, herring, shad, barracuda, monkfish, bluefish, shark, tilefish, swordfish, goldfish, gar, bowfin, flatfish, devilfish, dogfish, goby, flying fish, blackfish, whitefish, tuna, marlin, red snapper, grouper, mahi-mahi, roughy, grampus, pompano, haddock, hake, halibut, mullet, loach, muskellunge, bluefish, sardine, anchovy, smelt;

drink like a fish*

drink heavily, imbibe, get drunk; see drink 2.

like a fish out of water*

out of place, out of one's element, alien, displaced; see improper 1, unfamiliar 2.

neither fish, flesh, nor fowl

unrecognizable, indefinite, unknown, amorphous; see uncertain 2, vague 2.

fish Synonyms

fish

v.

go fishing, angle, troll, seine, net, trawl, fly-cast, bob, shrimp, clam, cast one's hook, bait the hook, whale, cast one's net, bait up*.

fish Usage Examples

Object

  • bait: Hugh fished Icelandic Red baits to the back of the island from peg 74.
  • maggot: Fishing on the dam between Pool Two and Pool Four, Mick fished double red maggot on an open-ended feeder.
  • boilie: Will fished a pineapple boilie out toward the center of the lake on a Size 8 hook and 12lb line.
  • caster: For best results try spraying caster regular across the swim and fish single caster on the hook.

Converse of object

  • catch: I got a bit bored with not catching fish too.
  • eat: Try to eat fish at least twice a week.

Adjective modifier

  • oily: Have no more than two portions of oily fish a week.
  • tropical: There were dolphins too, and a huge aquarium full of wonderful tropical fish.
  • coarse: It was to be coarse fish first for our McNab.
  • fresh: Fresh fish should be eaten on the day of purchase.
  • marine: Marine fish were gutted and muscle tissue taken for analysis.

Modifies a noun

  • stock: Many commercial fish stocks in European waters are not assessed.
  • tank: We have guides on all areas of keeping fish giving you the help you need to setup and maintain your fish tank or pond.
  • oil: Fish oil supplements made from fish liver should also be avoided.
  • farming: For anyone who likes the outdoor life fish farming can offer a rewarding career.
  • pond: On the rocks next to the fish pond is a restored Victorian bathing hut which adjoins a bathing pool.
  • dish: Have you ever wanted to create a simple fish dish to give to kids?

Noun used with modifier

  • freshwater: The Nile perch is the largest freshwater fish in the world accessible to anglers.
  • scorpion: Scorpion fish were abundant but luckily the one I almost squashed didn't take offense.
  • aquarium: Estuaries and mangroves are the two best known brackish water habitats, and both yield many different types of aquarium fish.
fish Quotes

Bill was a tropical fish. His native habitat was hot water.

—Anonymous

Everywhere, giant finned cars nose forward like fish; a savage servility slides by on grease.

—Lowell, RobertTraill Spence,Jr

   He had gone miles away For he drank like a fish Nightly, naturally Swimming towards the lure Of warm lit-up places.

—Heaney, SeamusJustin

All men are equal before a fish.

—Hoover, Herbert Clark

Summer time an'the livin' is easy, Fish are jumpin'an'the cotton is high. Oh, yo'daddy's rich, and yo'ma isgood-lookin', So hush, little baby, don' yo'cry.

—Heyward, Du Bose

Fish don't applaud.

—Hope, Bob originally LeslieTownes Hope

The Pobble who has no toes Had once as manyas we; When they said,'Some day you may lose them all'; He repliedö'Fish fiddle de-dee!' His Aunt Jobiska made him drink Lavender water tinged with pink, For she said,'The world in general knows There's nothing so good for a Pobble's toes!'

—Lear, Edward

He has gone to fish, for his Aunt Jobiska's Runcible Cat with crimson whiskers!

—Lear, Edward

Fish got to swim and birdsgot to fly I got to love one man till I die Can't help lovin'dat man of mine.

—Hammerstein, Oscar, II

Fish (fly-replete, in depth of June, Dawdling away their wat'ry noon).

—Brooke, Rupert Chawner

A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.

—Steinem, Gloria

Fish say, they have their stream and pond; But is there anything beyond?

—Brooke, Rupert Chawner

Ann, Ann! Come! quick as you can! There's a fish that talks In the frying pan.

—de la Mare,Walter

   Who, of men, can tell That flowers would bloom, or that green fruit would swell To melting pulp, that fish would have bright mail, The earth its dower of river, wood, and vale, The meadows runnels, runnels pebble-stones, The seed its harvest, or the lute its tones, Tones ravishment, or ravishment its sweet, If human souls did never kiss and greet?

—Keats,John

Science, which cuts its way through the muddy pond of daily lifewithout mingling with it, casts its wealthtoright and left, but the puny boatmen do not know how to fish for it.

—Herzen, Alexander Ivanovich

   Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts untoyourchildren, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

—Bible (NewTestament)

Thisisland ismademainlyofcoaland surrounded by fish. Only an organizing genius could produce a shortage of coal and a shortage of fish at the same time.

—Bevan, Aneurin

I often sigh still for the dark downward and vegetating kingdom of the fish and reptile.

—Lowell, RobertTraill Spence,Jr

   Knowledge does not keep any better than fish.

—Whitehead, Alfred North

I never lost a little fish.Yes, I am free to say. It always was the biggest fish I caught that got away.

—Field, Eugene

It's no fish ye're buyingöit's men's lives.

—Scott, Sir Walter

Unfading moths, immortal flies, And the worm that never dies. And in that heaven of all their wish, There shall be no more land, say fish.

—Brooke, Rupert Chawner

   Phone for the fish knives,Norman As Cook is a little unnerved; You kiddies have crumpled the serviettes And I must have things daintily served.

—Betjeman, SirJohn

And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb.

—Bible (NewTestament)

Any performance is discussable from the standpoint of what it attains or what it misses.Comprehensiveness can be discussed as superficiality, intensiveness as stricture, tolerance as uncertaintyöand the poor pedestrian abilities of a fish are clearly explainable in terms of his excellence as a swimmer. A way of seeing is also a way of not seeing.

—Burke, Kenneth

Our disputants put me in mind of the skuttle fish, that when he is unable to extricate himself, blackens all the water about him, till he becomes invisible.

—Addison,Joseph

The Salmon is the most stately fish that any man may angle to in fresh water.

—Berners, DameJuliana or Juliana Barnes   fl.14c

'Noble and generous Cetacean, have you ever tasted Man?' 'No,'said the Whale.'What is it like?' 'Nice,'said the small 'Stute Fish.'Nice but nubbly.'

—Kipling, (Joseph) Rudyard

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.

—Adams, Douglas Noe«  l

I love metaphor. It provides two loaves where there seems to be one. Sometimes it throws in a load of fish.

—Malamud, Bernard

To love is to be a fish. My boat wallows in the sea. You who are free, rescue the dead.

—Ignatow, David

Un-dish-cover the fish, or dishcover the riddle.

—Dodgson

Water too pure breeds no fish.

—Mao Zedong or MaoTse-tung

What female heart can gold despise? What cat's averse to fish?

—Gray,Thomas

Wise men fish here.

—Steloff, Frances

Or would you like to swing on a star Carry moonbeams home in a jar And be better off than you are Or would you rather be a fish?

—Burke,Johnny

Browse dictionary entries near fish

  1. ‹ Fischer
  2. ‹ fiscalist
  3. ‹ fiscal year
  4. ‹ fiscal policy
  5. ‹ fiscal
  6. ‹ fisc
  7. ‹ firth
  8. ‹ firstly
  9. ‹ firstling
  10. ‹ firsthand
  1. fish and chips ›
  2. fish crow ›
  3. fish farm ›
  4. fish finger ›
  5. fish flake ›
  6. fish flour ›
  7. fish for ›
  8. fish fry ›
  9. fish hawk ›
  10. fish joint ›