peck
Plural: pecks
Noun
- (often followed by `of') a large number or amount or extent
- a British imperial capacity measure (liquid or dry) equal to 2 gallons
- a United States dry measure equal to 8 quarts or 537.605 cubic inches
- An act of striking with a beak.
- A small kiss.
- One quarter of a bushel; a dry measure of eight quarts; equal to approximately 9092 cubic centimeters in the imperial system or 8810 cubic centimeters in the U.S. system.
- A great deal; a large or excessive quantity.
- Discoloration caused by fungus growth or insects.
- Food.
- Misspelling of pec.
Verb
Verb Forms: pecked, pecking, pecks
- To strike or jab quickly with a beak or pointed object.
- hit lightly with a picking motion
- eat by pecking at, like a bird
- kiss lightly
- eat like a bird
- bother persistently with trivial complaints
- To strike or pierce with the beak or bill (of a bird).
- To form by striking with the beak or a pointed instrument.
- To strike, pick, thrust against, or dig into, with a pointed instrument, especially with repeated quick movements.
- To seize and pick up with the beak, or as if with the beak; to bite; to eat; often with up.
- To do something in small, intermittent pieces.
- To type by searching for each key individually.
- To type in general.
- To kiss briefly.
- To throw.
- To lurch forward; especially, of a horse, to stumble after hitting the ground with the toe instead of the flat of the foot.
Examples
- He has been pecking away at that project for some time now.
- He would peck at the board with small words, waiting for a chance to play a longer one.
- She figured most children probably ate a peck of dirt before they turned ten.
- The birds pecked at their food.
- They picked a peck of wheat.
- to peck a hole in a tree
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English pecken, pekken, variant of Middle English piken, picken, pikken (“to pick, use a pointed implement”). More at pick.
Synonyms
batch, beak, deal, flock, good deal, great deal, hatful, heap, hen-peck, lot, mass, mess, mickle, mint, mountain, muckle, nag, passel, peck at, pick, pick at, pick up, pile, plenty, pot, quite a little, raft, sight, slew, smack, spate, stack, tidy sum, wad, bung, cast, chuck, chunk, cook, dash, dump, feck, fling, heave, hield, hoy, huck, hurl, hurtle, jerk, launch, lob, peck, peg, pitch, precipitate, project, quoit, shy, skew, slight, sling, thrill, throw, toss, traject, warp, whang, whip, whop, wing
Scrabble Score: 12
peck: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordpeck: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
peck: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary