bunny
Pluralbunnies
Pluralbunnies
- 1A rabbit, especially a young one.
A little brown bunny was nibbling the lettuce in our garden this morning.
Our daughter begged us to adopt one of the shelter's bunnies.
UsageMakes a rabbit sound cute, as in the Easter Bunny; in neutral writing say rabbit.
Similarrabbit
- 2In skiing, easy and not at all challenging, especially of a slope or hill.
Most resorts put the bunny slope right beside the lodge, where beginners can practice.
After two days on the bunny hill, the kids were ready for a real run.
UsageAlmost always before a noun: bunny slope, bunny hill.
Oppositedifficult, challenging
Note
It is rarely said after a verb, yet it can still be compared for fun, as when Carey Heywood's Sawyer Says (2014) has "the bunniest of bunny hills."
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Carey Heywood wrote Sawyer Says. en.wiktionary.org
- Sawyer Says contains the quoted phrase. en.wiktionary.org
- 3A waitress at a nightclub who wears a costume with rabbit ears and a tail; a bunny girl.
Before she became an actress, she spent two years as a bunny in a downtown nightclub.
The club's bunnies had to keep their ears and tails spotless for every shift.
- 4A snack of hollowed-out bread filled with curry, also called bunny chow.
After a morning in the surf, we queued for a quarter bunny with chicken curry.
The takeaway on the corner sells mutton and bean bunnies until midnight.
UsageOrdered by size: a quarter bunny, a half bunny. Elsewhere the full name bunny chow is clearer.
Note
In South Africa the clipped form is the ordinary way to order it. Steve Pike's Surfing South Africa has Durban surfers growing up on bunnies, with the square of bread cut from the loaf kept for dunking back into the curry.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- The book describes Durban surfers growing up on bunnies and using the removed square of bread to dunk into the curry. en.wiktionary.org
Less common meanings
- 5In cricket, a batsman whom one particular bowler dismisses again and again.
The opener was the fast bowler's bunny, falling to him in five straight innings.
Left-handers were his bunnies, and he dismissed them cheaply all series.
UsageUsually with a possessive naming the bowler: the spinner's bunny, his bunny.
Similarrabbit
Note
Cricket already calls such a batsman a rabbit, and bunny is the same idea in nursery form.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Cricket uses rabbit for a batsman repeatedly dismissed by the same bowler; bunny has the same meaning. en.wikipedia.org
- Bunny is a diminutive formation referring to a rabbit. en.wiktionary.org
- 6Bun-like; having the qualities of a small bread roll.
If you would like to make some buns with more of a Chelsea bunlike texture follow the recipe above, but increase the flour to 300g (11oz). This will make them less rich and more 'bunny'.
2012, Sue Simkins, Cooking With Mrs SimkinsNote
The kitchen's own coinage comes from bun and -y, the way cakey and bready are formed, and it turns up in talk about texture. It is rare and meant to amuse, so it sits best in quotation marks, as when Sue Simkins's Cooking With Mrs Simkins (2012) wants buns less rich and more 'bunny': the marks show the pun is deliberate.
- 7A slang, euphemistic name for a menstrual pad, used to avoid naming it directly.
- 8A bump or swelling caused by a blow.
- 9In mining, a sudden swelling or mass of ore, as distinct from a vein or lode.
- 10A chine or gully worn by water running over a cliff edge; also, a wooded glen or small ravine that opens through a line of cliffs to the sea.
Friar's Cliff and Highcliffe have always been what the second name suggests: cliffs too high to scale easily and with no convenient bunnies, chines or combes.
1983, Geoffrey Morley, Smuggling in Hampshire and Dorset - 11A small drain or culvert, especially a short covered one linking two ditches.
- 12A small pool of water.
- 13A brick arch or wooden bridge covered with earth, spanning a channel in a water meadow and just wide enough for a hay wagon to cross.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origins
From bun (“rabbit”) + the diminutive suffix -y. Bun probably comes from Scottish Gaelic bun (“bottom, butt, stump”), from Old Irish bun (“the thick end of anything, base”) and Proto-Celtic *bonus, though its origin is uncertain. Together with rabbit, bunny has largely replaced the older word cony, which once rhymed with it.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
- Bunny derives from bun meaning rabbit plus the diminutive suffix -y. en.wiktionary.org
- Bun probably derives from Scottish Gaelic bun, with the stated meanings, through Old Irish bun and Proto-Celtic *bonus; the English word's ultimate origin remains uncertain. en.wiktionary.org
- Rabbit and bunny largely displaced the older word cony. en.wiktionary.org
- Cony formerly rhymed with bunny. en.wiktionary.org
Formed from bun (“small bread roll”) + -y.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 1 fact
- For the adjective meaning resembling a bread roll, bunny is formed from bun (“small bread roll”) plus -y. en.wiktionary.org