dasyurid marsupial
- noun
- Australian
:
marsupial dasyurido
- One well-known dasyurid marsupial is the Tasmanian devil, famous for its aggressive behavior.
Examples
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The dasyurid marsupial hunts insects and small animals at night in the Australian outback.
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Many dasyurid marsupials play a vital role in maintaining ecological balance by controlling pest populations.
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The dasyurid marsupial is known for its sharp teeth.
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Many dasyurid marsupials are found in Tasmania.
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The dasyurid marsupial hunts insects and small animals at night in the Australian outback.
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One well-known dasyurid marsupial is the Tasmanian devil, famous for its aggressive behavior.
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Many dasyurid marsupials play a vital role in maintaining ecological balance by controlling pest populations.
Synonyms
A small meat-eating marsupial active at night in Australia and Tasmania
A small meat-eating mammal that carries its young in a pouch, from Australia or New Guinea
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is fully compositional: 'dasyurid' names a subgroup (Dasyuridae) and 'marsupial' names the broader class, so a learner who knows both constituents will understand it as a marsupial belonging to the dasyurids (i.e. the small carnivorous nocturnal Australian marsupials). This type of taxonomic modifier + noun construction is common cross-linguistically and therefore transparent to B1 learners who know the parts.
Etymology
Dasyurid marsupial names small, meat-eating pouch animals from Australia and Tasmania, like the Tasmanian devil, often active at night. The word dasyurid groups the small, furry-tailed hunters and marsupial shows they carry babies in a pouch, so the phrase means these small meat-eating pouch mammals.
