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The Collaborative International Dictionary
Fishes

Fish \Fish\, n.; pl. Fishes (f[i^]sh"[e^]z), or collectively, Fish. [OE. fisch, fisc, fis, AS. fisc; akin to D. visch, OS. & OHG. fisk, G. fisch, Icel. fiskr, Sw. & Dan. fisk, Goth. fisks, L. piscis, Ir. iasg. Cf. Piscatorial. In some cases, such as fish joint, fish plate, this word has prob. been confused with fish, fr. F. fichea peg.]

  1. A name loosely applied in popular usage to many animals of diverse characteristics, living in the water.

  2. (Zo["o]l.) An oviparous, vertebrate animal usually having fins and a covering scales or plates. It breathes by means of gills, and lives almost entirely in the water. See Pisces.

    Note: The true fishes include the Teleostei (bony fishes), Ganoidei, Dipnoi, and Elasmobranchii or Selachians (sharks and skates). Formerly the leptocardia and Marsipobranciata were also included, but these are now generally regarded as two distinct classes, below the fishes.

  3. pl. The twelfth sign of the zodiac; Pisces.

  4. The flesh of fish, used as food.

  5. (Naut.)

    1. A purchase used to fish the anchor.

    2. A piece of timber, somewhat in the form of a fish, used to strengthen a mast or yard. Note: Fish is used adjectively or as part of a compound word; as, fish line, fish pole, fish spear, fish-bellied. Age of Fishes. See under Age, n., 8. Fish ball, fish (usually salted codfish) shared fine, mixed with mashed potato, and made into the form of a small, round cake. [U.S.] Fish bar. Same as Fish plate (below). Fish beam (Mech.), a beam one of whose sides (commonly the under one) swells out like the belly of a fish. --Francis. Fish crow (Zo["o]l.), a species of crow ( Corvus ossifragus), found on the Atlantic coast of the United States. It feeds largely on fish. Fish culture, the artifical breeding and rearing of fish; pisciculture. Fish davit. See Davit. Fish day, a day on which fish is eaten; a fast day. Fish duck (Zo["o]l.), any species of merganser. Fish fall, the tackle depending from the fish davit, used in hauling up the anchor to the gunwale of a ship. Fish garth, a dam or weir in a river for keeping fish or taking them easily. Fish glue. See Isinglass. Fish joint, a joint formed by a plate or pair of plates fastened upon two meeting beams, plates, etc., at their junction; -- used largely in connecting the rails of railroads. Fish kettle, a long kettle for boiling fish whole. Fish ladder, a dam with a series of steps which fish can leap in order to ascend falls in a river. Fish line, or Fishing line, a line made of twisted hair, silk, etc., used in angling. Fish louse (Zo["o]l.), any crustacean parasitic on fishes, esp. the parasitic Copepoda, belonging to Caligus, Argulus, and other related genera. See Branchiura. Fish maw (Zo["o]l.), the stomach of a fish; also, the air bladder, or sound. Fish meal, fish desiccated and ground fine, for use in soups, etc. Fish oil, oil obtained from the bodies of fish and marine animals, as whales, seals, sharks, from cods' livers, etc. Fish owl (Zo["o]l.), a fish-eating owl of the Old World genera Scotopelia and Ketupa, esp. a large East Indian species ( K. Ceylonensis). Fish plate, one of the plates of a fish joint. Fish pot, a wicker basket, sunk, with a float attached, for catching crabs, lobsters, etc. Fish pound, a net attached to stakes, for entrapping and catching fish; a weir. [Local, U.S.] --Bartlett. Fish slice, a broad knife for dividing fish at table; a fish trowel. Fish slide, an inclined box set in a stream at a small fall, or ripple, to catch fish descending the current. --Knight. Fish sound, the air bladder of certain fishes, esp. those that are dried and used as food, or in the arts, as for the preparation of isinglass. Fish story, a story which taxes credulity; an extravagant or incredible narration. [Colloq. U.S.] --Bartlett. Fish strainer.

      1. A metal colander, with handles, for taking fish from a boiler.

      2. A perforated earthenware slab at the bottom of a dish, to drain the water from a boiled fish.

        Fish trowel, a fish slice.

        Fish weir or Fish wear, a weir set in a stream, for catching fish.

        Neither fish nor flesh, Neither fish nor fowl (Fig.), neither one thing nor the other.

Wiktionary
fishes

n. 1 (plural of fish nodot=1 English) 2 # (context universal English) ''multiple kinds of fish'' 3 # (context usually nonstandard or archaic English) ''multiple aquatic, cold-blooded, vertebrate animals'' vb. (en-third-person singular of: fish)

WordNet
fish
  1. n. any of various mostly cold-blooded aquatic vertebrates usually having scales and breathing through gills; "the shark is a large fish"; "in the livingroom there was a tank of colorful fish"

  2. the flesh of fish used as food; "in Japan most fish is eaten raw"; "after the scare about foot-and-mouth disease a lot of people started eating fish instead of meat"; "they have a chef who specializes in fish"

  3. (astrology) a person who is born while the sun is in Pisces [syn: Pisces]

  4. the twelfth sign of the zodiac; the sun is in this sign from about February 19 to March 20 [syn: Pisces, Pisces the Fishes]

  5. [also: fishes (pl)]

fish
  1. v. seek indirectly; "fish for compliments" [syn: angle]

  2. catch or try to catch fish or shellfish; "I like to go fishing on weekends"

  3. [also: fishes (pl)]

fishes

See fish

Usage examples of "fishes".

Have you sufficiently observed the wonders it covers, its fishes, its zoophytes, its parterres of sponges, and its forests of coral?

Indian Sea breedeth the most and the biggest fishes that are: among which the Whales and Whirlpooles called Balaene, take up as much in length as four acres or arpens of land.

If we do NOT know them all--if Nature has still secrets in the deeps for us, nothing is more conformable to reason than to admit the existence of fishes, or cetaceans of other kinds, or even of new species, of an organisation formed to inhabit the strata inaccessible to soundings, and which an accident of some sort has brought at long intervals to the upper level of the ocean.

Border-burns still manage to toss out some dozens of tiny fishes, some six or eight to the pound.

Let us not grudge him his sport as long as he fishes fair, and he is always good company.

Clearburn alone remains full of unsophisticated fishes, and I have the less hesitation in revealing this, because I do not expect the wanderer who may read this page to be at all more successful than myself.

Rome as the Romans do, and fishes for salmon in Tweed when the nets are off in October, when the yellowing leaves begin to fall, and when that beautiful reach of wooded valley from Elibank to the meeting of Tweed and Ettrick is in the height of its autumnal charm.

Then he was one with the fishes who were, and had always been, his destiny.

Mealy, unpalatable fishes the like of which I have never before heard, with names like monkfish, cusk and hagfish.

To those who have not chanced specially to study the subject, it may possibly seem strange, that fishes not commonly exceeding four or five feet should be marshalled among WHALES--a word, which, in the popular sense, always conveys an idea of hugeness.

The light came from ornaments that hung from the edges of the awning: chains of bronze, which ended in little flat fishes and birds.

He thinks of the loaves and fishes even when he believes his is in a real Presence.

These fishes, like the tortoise, the armadillo, the sea-hedgehog, and the Crustacea, are protected by a breastplate which is neither chalky nor stony, but real bone.

I noticed that in the Red Sea and in the Mediterranean there existed a certain number of fishes of a kind perfectly identical.

The species of fishes here did not differ much from those already noticed.