Biology Slang, Jargon, and New Words from Double-Tongued Dictionary

Biology, including plants, animals, and the study of them. You can also see entries assigned to this category.

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bucket biologist n. The balance of nature in every lake is so fine that an ignorant bucket biologist has the potential to plunder and vandalize a fishery.…Bucket biologists are hard at work all over the country. Walleyes are being dumped into Montana lakes. Rainbow trout are destroying native brook trout fisheries in the East.…Bucket biologists are ignorant, selfish people. If professional biologists make mistakes—a case in point is the introduction of stripers at Lake McConaughy—how can the bomb-like buckets of amateurs not explode? [English Animals, Insects, & Birds Biology Environment] [full cite] (Sep. 1, 2006)

bucket biology n. There’s no doubt in my mind that northern pike have been put in.…I think it’s called “bucket biology.” They probably were brought over here from the Valentine refuge lakes during the winter. [English Animals, Insects, & Birds Biology Environment] [full cite] (Sep. 1, 2006)

bucket biology n. This illegal introduction, like the Arnica Creek episode, is a sign of a phenomenon widespread in lakes and streams throughout North America. Known among fisheries professionals as bucket biology, these clandestine actions put the preferences of a few selfish individuals above the needs of the public and the well-being of countless priceless aquatic resources. [English Animals, Insects, & Birds Biology Environment] [full cite] (Sep. 1, 2006)

bumblebeetle n. In 200 million years, evolution brings bizarre animals like “flish,” birds that evolved from fish; “bumblebeetles,” beetles that fly; and “megasquid,” multi-ton, land-based squid creatures. [English Animals, Insects, & Birds Biology] [full cite] (May. 4, 2005)

castings n.pl. The worm’s waste materials, delicately referred to as “castings,” or, indelicately, as “poop,” are eaten by microbes and fungi, allowing them to grow and reproduce and sequester minerals from the soil. [English Animals, Insects, & Birds Biology] [full cite] (May. 11, 2007)

comp n. His first assignment as he shadowed the team: cleaning up a three-week “comp” near Milwaukee, Wisc. That’s shorthand for “an apartment in which someone died and laid, unfound, for three weeks.” [English Biology Police Jargon Abbreviation] [full cite] (Jun. 11, 2007)

conk n. Often the first thing that is observed is what is called a conk—this is a diagnostic sign. The conk starts as a button-like growth that forms near the base of the trunk. This mushroom manifestation eventually changes into a shelf fungi; half-moon in shape and up to 8 inches wide and 2 inches thick. [English Biology] [full cite] (Sep. 10, 2006)

crypsis n. Animals can remain concealed when their overall coloration (box 1) resembles or matches the natural background of their environment (Endler 1978). This phenomenon, also known as general color resemblance, includes crypsis (a type of camouflage), in which overall body color resembles the general color of the habitat, or pattern blending, in which color patterns on the body match patterns of light and dark in the environment. [English Biology Science Jargon] [full cite] (Feb. 24, 2005)

crypsis n. In those insect which gain protection from mechanisms other than crypsis (warning, threat and flash coloration), or even in those cryptic moths which benefit from resembling dead leaves, the melanics are rare, recessive, sub-lethal and are probably retained by recurrent mutation. [English Biology Jargon] [full cite] (Feb. 25, 2005)

crypsis n. The correlation between body weight and the presence of horns in females may be a consequence of the relation between body weight and antipredator behavior in antelopes: smaller species rely on crypsis or flight while large species often show direct defense against predators. [English Biology Jargon] [full cite] (Feb. 25, 2005)

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