quawk

English

Noun

quawk (plural quawks)

1. (US) The black-crowned night heron, Nycticorax nycticorax.
2. The harsh call of this or other birds.

Verb

quawk (third-person singular simple present quawks, present participle quawking, simple past and past participle quawked)

1. Of birds, to give loud, harsh vocalisations.
   • 1873, A. C. Chambers, Life underground, in the church tower, the woods, and the old keep, page 71:

     […] they were rejoiced to see one of the two lost nestlings sitting on the window ledge near his old home. […] "I have much to tell, father," said the young one; "but I am so exhausted, my food having been of the scantiest, that I have hardly breath to quawk."

   • 1964, John Clare, The Later Poems of John Clare, page 203:

     The old crows quawked for men had cut / Among the oak wood trees.

   • 1998, Paul Hutchens, The White Boat Rescue, page 19:

     How often, at an outdoor barbecue, or when having drinks on the terrace after some Washington dinner party, have I heard, above the buzz of conversation, night herons quawking overhead on their way from Rock Creek Park[.]