Spine-tail

[SPINE sb.¹]

  1.  Ornith. One or other of several birds of unrelated genera characterized by their stiff, spine-like or mucronate tail-feathers.

1839.  Audubon, Syn. Birds N. Amer., 33. Chætura, Spine-tail. Ibid. Chætura pelasgia, American Spine-tail.

c. 1880.  Cassell’s Nat. Hist., IV. 111. The third family of the Mesomyodi, or Songless Birds, the Spine-tails (Dendrocolaptidæ).

1890.  Cent. Dict., Orthonyx, a remarkable Australian genus of passerine birds; the spinetails. Ibid. (1891), Spine-tail, the ruddy duck, Erismatura rubida.

1893.  W. H. Hudson, Nat. La Plata, 371. Small Spine tail [Synallaxis phryganophila] and Nest.

  b.  attrib. in spine-tail grouse, swift.

1884.  Coues, N. Amer. Birds, 457. Chæturinæ, Spine-tail Swifts. Ibid., 580. Centrocercus,… Spine-tail Grouse.

  2.  Ichth. (See quots.)

1851.  Gosse, Nat. Hist., Fishes, 147. Teuthididæ. (Spine-tails.) Ibid., 148. In form and general appearance the Spine-tails resemble the Chætodons.