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Borer   Listen
noun
Borer  n.  
1.
One that bores; an instrument for boring.
2.
(Zool.)
(a)
A marine, bivalve mollusk, of the genus Teredo and allies, which burrows in wood. See Teredo.
(b)
Any bivalve mollusk (Saxicava, Lithodomus, etc.) which bores into limestone and similar substances.
(c)
One of the larvae of many species of insects, which penetrate trees, as the apple, peach, pine, etc. See Apple borer, under Apple.
(d)
The hagfish (Myxine).






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Borer" Quotes from Famous Books



... most likely another Cornish word, which by a metamorphic process, has been slightly changed in order to yield some sense intelligible to Saxon speakers. We find in Cornish tarad, meaning a piercer, a borer; and, in another form, tardar is distinctly used, together with axe and hammer, as the name of a mining implement. The Latin taratrum, Gr. {GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU}{GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller

... then, to know what other insects are employed in holding them in check, by feeding on them. Some of our most formidable insects have been accidentally imported from Europe, such as the codling moth, asparagus beetle, cabbage butterfly, currant worm and borer, elm-tree beetle, hessian fly, etc.; but in nearly every instance these have come over without bringing their insect enemies with them, and in consequence they have spread more extensively here than in Europe. It was therefore urged that the Agricultural Department at Washington be requested to ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 275 • Various

... stalks of corn, tomatoes, potatoes, dahlias, asters, and also in young currant bushes, besides feeding on many species of weeds. By a close inspection of the plants about the beginning of July, the spot where the borer entered, which is generally quite a distance from the ground, may be detected, and the caterpillar cut out without injury to the plant. This plan is impracticable for an extensive crop, but by destroying the borers found in the vines that wilt suddenly, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 803, May 23, 1891 • Various

... processes; especially as regards the working of metal. He goes already to the potter's wheel for familiar, life-like illustration. In describing artistic wood-work he distinguishes various stages of work; we see clearly the instruments for turning and boring, such as the old-fashioned drill-borer, whirled round with a string; he mentions the names of two artists, the one of an actual workman, the other of a craft turned into a proper name—stray relics, accidentally preserved, of a world, as we may believe, of such wide and varied activity. The forge of ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater

... unfortunately they are not ornithologists, and a peckerwood is a peckerwood to them; and so while the poor downy, the red-head, and the hairy woodpeckers are seen busily at work cutting the life threads of the injurious borer larvae, the farmer, thinking of his dying trees, slays them all without mercy or distinction. The sapsucker is never as confiding as the downy, and from a safe distance sees others murdered for sins which are ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe

... up and down the branches and trunk of the tree, the squirrel Ratatosk (branch-borer), the typical busybody and tale-bearer, passed its time repeating to the dragon below the remarks of the eagle above, and vice versa, in the hope of stirring up ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber

... he says, you will get a small crop the second year after planting and for the third and subsequent years a full crop. The important thing is to keep the dead canes well pruned out, as the cane borer is one of the worst insect pests. When they appear they can be stopped by cutting off the shoot several inches below the puncture as soon as it begins to droop, and burning the part cut off. Again, ...
— Three Acres and Liberty • Bolton Hall

... two secretaries. Given four, they name a keeper of records, and the office is ready for work; five, they convene a general meeting, and the club is fully constituted. So things were managed in Baltimore. The inventor of a new cannon associated himself with the caster and the borer. Thus was formed the nucleus of the "Gun Club." In a single month after its formation it numbered 1,833 effective members and ...
— Jules Verne's Classic Books • Jules Verne

... large borer at work on some of my hickories, but have not as yet determined its species. It may be the painted hickory borer (Cylene), or the locust borer. It makes a hole as large as a small lead pencil, directly into the trunk or limbs, and excavates long tunnels into the heart wood. ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Second Annual Meeting - Ithaca, New York, December 14 and 15, 1911 • Northern Nut Growers Association

... proceeds, a register is kept by the judicious borer of the different strata passed through, and also of the veins of water and oil passed through, in order to the formation of an intelligent judgment in tubing ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various

... tower-like clusters of old-pink bells bending always a little towards the southeast, where most sun comes from. As I thin my forget-me-not I see it—in my mind's eye—in a blue mist of spring bloom. Thus, a garden rises in my fancy, a garden where neither beetle, borer, nor cutworm doth corrupt, and where the mole doth not break in or steal, where gentle rain and blessed sun come as they are needed, where all the flowers bloom unceasingly in colors of heavenly light—a garden such as never yet existed nor ever shall, ...
— More Jonathan Papers • Elisabeth Woodbridge

... perforating my partitions; it nibbles at them a little; and I had to judge the direction from the marks of its mandibles. These marks, which are not always very plain, do not yet allow me to pronounce an opinion. Solenius vagus, who is a skilful borer, behaved differently from the Osmia. In a column of ten, the whole exodus was made ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre

... huge bee in steel-blue armour, booming straight at you—whom some one compared to the Lord Mayor's man in armour turned into a cherub, and broken loose—(get out of his way, for he is absorbed in business)— is probably a wood-borer, {85c} of whose work you may read in Mr. Wood's Homes without Hands. That long black wasp, commonly called a Jack Spaniard, builds pensile paper nests under every roof and shed. Watch, now, this more delicate brown wasp, probably one of the ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley



Words linked to "Borer" :   corn borer, bore, cross bit, stone drill, bore bit, woodborer, European corn borer moth, straight-fluted drill, drill, invertebrate, star drill, corn borer moth, straight flute



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