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Glite Dictionary
green-winged teal

green-winged teal

1 7.3
A small duck that has a bright green patch on its wings
  • noun
  • /ˈɡriːnˌwɪŋd tiːl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : pato de alas verdes
  • In September, we start seeing some green-winged teal, and then the geese start to arrive sometime around the last week in September.

Examples

  • It was first noticed in early September when a Metro biologist reported seeing dead green-winged teals.

    Blog text (31)

  • "That's a green-winged teal."

    Fiction book (1999)

  • A small flock of green-winged teal swam close to shore, the mask above their eyes shining emerald in the sun.

  • The attached photo from November 29th depicts several thousand American green-winged teal and northern pintails foraging in some shallowly flooded moist-soil vegetation.

Synonyms

teal
vsgreen-winged teal
2 4.1

A small duck with a short neck that feeds in shallow water

is a specific species noted for an iridescent green patch on its wings
greenwing
vsgreen-winged teal
  • UK
9.3

A small duck with a green patch on its wing that lives in marshes

is the longer, more descriptive name used for that same bird
Anas crecca
vsgreen-winged teal
  • Specialized
9.9

A small duck with a green eye patch that feeds in shallow water

is the English descriptive name focusing on the green wing patch

Surface Forms

green-winged teal singular
green-winged teals plural

Morphology

green-winged + teal

The compound is compositional: 'green-winged' (having green wings) modifies 'teal' (a small dabbling duck), so the meaning 'a teal with green-colored wings' is directly derivable from the parts. This adjective+noun pattern is a standard, cross-linguistic compositional construction and would be understandable to a B1 learner who knows the constituent words.

Etymology

The name green-winged teal comes from how the bird looks: it is a 'small duck' called a teal with a bright green patch on its wing, so the name tells you what the bird looks like.