Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Any of various mammals of the order Carnivora, including the dogs, cats, bears, weasels, raccoons, and seals, most of which are predatory flesh-eating animals.
  • noun Any of various other flesh-eating animals.
  • noun An insectivorous plant.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A carnivorous animal; one of the Carnivora.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Zoöl.) One of the Carnivora.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Any animal that eats meat as the main part of its diet.
  • noun taxonomy A mammal belonging to the order Carnivora.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun any animal that feeds on flesh
  • noun a terrestrial or aquatic flesh-eating mammal

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From French, meat-eating, from Latin carnivorus; see carnivorous.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Ultimately from Latin carnivorus.

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Examples

  • Camera traps, said Lyren, are widely used in carnivore research because they help document the behavior and distribution of these more elusive, often-nocturnal animals … This camera trap is on the former El Toro Marine Base, an area that burned last week in the Orange County Santiago Fire.

    Images: USGS Cameras Capture Dramatic Wildfire-Wildlife Images « ResourceShelf 2007

  • 'New Bornean carnivore' is most likely a little known flying squirrel

    Archive 2007-01-01 2007

  • And the thing that broke my heart wasn’t that she didn’t know the definition of the word carnivore; I could live with that.

    Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs Chuck Klosterman 2003

  • And the thing that broke my heart wasn’t that she didn’t know the definition of the word carnivore; I could live with that.

    Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs Chuck Klosterman 2003

  • And the thing that broke my heart wasn’t that she didn’t know the definition of the word carnivore; I could live with that.

    Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs Chuck Klosterman 2003

  • For the owners of the Ivy to worry about people thinking they are just for VIPs is a little like a lion getting upset for being called a carnivore.

    Restaurant review: 34 2012

  • At some point, Leaellynasaura, a Lower Cretaceous hypsilophodontid from Victoria, Australia, was described as a carnivore when it, like all hypsilophodontids, is actually an herbivore.

    Entry #1,909 greygirlbeast 2008

  • St. John is known as a carnivore's paradise -- its signature dish is roast bone marrow, served with a parsley salad -- but Mr. Rowe says the restaurant's insistence on British cuisine has resulted in widespread use of local fruits and vegetables.

    How Sustainable Is Your Restaurant? 2009

  • One of them is an FBI tool called carnivore which some people may have heard of.

    CNN Transcript Sep 24, 2001 2001

  • "This may explain why the panda diet is primarily herbivorous even though it is classified as a carnivore," says Wang.

    Scientific American 2009

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