to milk
- verb
- /mɪlk/
- I always thought milking a cow would be fun, till I tried it.
- milk a cow
- milk twice a day
- milk twice daily
A farm farmer milked a cow by hand.
- A farm farmer milked a cow by hand.
- He got up before dawn to milk his goats.
- But dude, they're we all are milking almonds.
Examples
-
We'd help milk his cows, mend fences for him, and go haul hay.
Academic text (2018) -
Cows were milked twice a day, and individual milk production was recorded at milking time.
Academic text (2015) -
I had to milk a goat to get it.
-
Land for the taking and enough space for a man to milk his cow in.
Fiction book (1993) -
Feed the hens, and milk the cows.
-
How do you feel about milking cows the rest of your life?
-
Well, the cow's here to be milked.
-
He got up before dawn to milk his goats.
-
Buffaloes were milked twice daily with an interval of approximately 12 hours at all the farms.
Academic text (2013) -
He got up before dawn to milk his goats.
Idioms
To waste time being upset about something that already happened and cannot be changed
Compounds
A tall prickly plant with purple flowers and white spots on leaves used in herbal medicine to help the liver
A kind of milk with the fat broken into tiny pieces so cream does not rise
- Specialized
A small plant with purple flowers that grows every year on high mountain slopes
- US
A harmless tan and brown snake often with red stripes and an arrow spot on its head
- Specialized
A milky liquid used to make things less acidic, for example in tanning and water treatment
- Specialized
An illness people get from drinking milk from cows that ate a poisonous plant
- Specialized
A condition when the body cannot digest milk because it cannot break down milk sugar
- US
A harmless North American snake with red, black, and white bands that looks like a coral snake
A thin yellow liquid left after milk is curdled and the solids are removed to make cheese
- Archaic
Sick after eating meat or drinking milk from animals that eat poisonous plants
Surface Forms
Etymology
Milk as a verb comes from the same old word melk, which meant 'to suck' or 'to draw milk', so to milk an animal is to take the white liquid it makes for its young.