gridiron-tailed lizard
- noun
- US
:
lagarto de cola de parrilla
- During our hike, we were excited to observe a gridiron-tailed lizard with its distinctive black-banded tail.
Examples
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The gridiron-tailed lizard is known for sprinting quickly across the hot desert sands.
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We spotted a gridiron-tailed lizard basking on a rock during our trip to Arizona.
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Researchers studied the gridiron-tailed lizard to understand how it survives extreme temperatures.
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The gridiron-tailed lizard is known for its speed.
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Have you ever seen a gridiron-tailed lizard in the wild?
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The gridiron-tailed lizard can often be seen darting between cacti in the desert.
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In the scorching sun, the gridiron-tailed lizard quickly moved to find shade beneath a shrub.
Synonyms
A fast desert lizard with a long black-banded tail and long legs
A fast, long-legged desert lizard with a black-banded tail from the southwest United States and Mexico
Surface Forms
Morphology
gridiron-tailed + lizard
This is a straightforward descriptive compound: 'gridiron-tailed' describes the lizard's tail, so a learner who knows 'gridiron' and the adjectival '-tailed' pattern can infer 'having a tail like a gridiron' (i.e., patterned or banded) and thus 'a lizard with such a tail'. The structure (modifier + noun) and the compositional meaning are regular and cross-linguistically common, making the expression transparently interpretable by a B1 learner who knows the constituents.
Etymology
Gridiron-tailed lizard may come from the dark, regular bands on its tail, which look like the bars of a small gridiron ('a cooking grill'). That's why the name helps you remember it: a fast desert lizard with a long, banded tail.
