"eat like a bird" meaning in English

See eat like a bird in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: En-au-eat like a bird.ogg [Australia] Forms: eats like a bird [present, singular, third-person], eating like a bird [participle, present], ate like a bird [past], eaten like a bird [participle, past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|eat<,,ate,eaten> like a bird}} eat like a bird (third-person singular simple present eats like a bird, present participle eating like a bird, simple past ate like a bird, past participle eaten like a bird)
  1. (colloquial, simile) To eat in small amounts rather than in a single full meal. Tags: colloquial Related terms: watch like a hawk (english: something) Translations (to eat small amounts): 吃得少 (Chinese Mandarin), syödä kuin varpunen (Finnish), manger comme un moineau (French), jeść jak ptaszek (Polish), comer como um passarinho (Portuguese), comer como un pajarito (Spanish)
    Sense id: en-eat_like_a_bird-en-verb-jSTSCl6w Categories (other): English similes

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for eat like a bird meaning in English (2.2kB)

{
  "antonyms": [
    {
      "word": "eat like a horse"
    },
    {
      "word": "eat like an animal"
    }
  ],
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "eats like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "eating like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "ate like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "eaten like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "eat<,,ate,eaten> like a bird"
      },
      "expansion": "eat like a bird (third-person singular simple present eats like a bird, present participle eating like a bird, simple past ate like a bird, past participle eaten like a bird)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English similes",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To eat in small amounts rather than in a single full meal."
      ],
      "id": "en-eat_like_a_bird-en-verb-jSTSCl6w",
      "links": [
        [
          "eat",
          "eat"
        ],
        [
          "small",
          "small"
        ],
        [
          "amount",
          "amount"
        ],
        [
          "single",
          "single"
        ],
        [
          "full",
          "full"
        ],
        [
          "meal",
          "meal"
        ]
      ],
      "qualifier": "simile",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(colloquial, simile) To eat in small amounts rather than in a single full meal."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "english": "something",
          "word": "watch like a hawk"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "吃得少"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "syödä kuin varpunen"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "manger comme un moineau"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "jeść jak ptaszek"
        },
        {
          "code": "pt",
          "lang": "Portuguese",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "comer como um passarinho"
        },
        {
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "sense": "to eat small amounts",
          "word": "comer como un pajarito"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-eat like a bird.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/e/e1/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "eat like a bird"
}
{
  "antonyms": [
    {
      "word": "eat like a horse"
    },
    {
      "word": "eat like an animal"
    }
  ],
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "eats like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "eating like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "ate like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "eaten like a bird",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "eat<,,ate,eaten> like a bird"
      },
      "expansion": "eat like a bird (third-person singular simple present eats like a bird, present participle eating like a bird, simple past ate like a bird, past participle eaten like a bird)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "english": "something",
      "word": "watch like a hawk"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English colloquialisms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English similes",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English verbs"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To eat in small amounts rather than in a single full meal."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "eat",
          "eat"
        ],
        [
          "small",
          "small"
        ],
        [
          "amount",
          "amount"
        ],
        [
          "single",
          "single"
        ],
        [
          "full",
          "full"
        ],
        [
          "meal",
          "meal"
        ]
      ],
      "qualifier": "simile",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(colloquial, simile) To eat in small amounts rather than in a single full meal."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-eat like a bird.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/e/e1/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/En-au-eat_like_a_bird.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "Australia"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (AU)"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "吃得少"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "syödä kuin varpunen"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "manger comme un moineau"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "jeść jak ptaszek"
    },
    {
      "code": "pt",
      "lang": "Portuguese",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "comer como um passarinho"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "sense": "to eat small amounts",
      "word": "comer como un pajarito"
    }
  ],
  "word": "eat like a bird"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-04-13 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-04-01 using wiktextract (ee658f9 and be4df6b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.