hedgehog
Pluralhedgehogs
Verbhedgehogs, hedgehogging, hedgehogged
Pluralhedgehogs
Formshedgehogs, hedgehogging, hedgehogged
- 1A small animal with sharp spines on its back that rolls into a ball when scared.
Like a small ball of spines that can roll up to stay safe.
A hedgehog snuffled through the leaves looking for worms.
We watched the hedgehogs curl into tight balls when the dog came near.
Note
- 2Any spiny animal, like a porcupine, that looks a lot like a hedgehog.
Like calling any spiky animal a hedgehog, even when it is really a porcupine.
A hedgehog waddled across the trail, its quills rattling as it climbed the nearest pine.
Farmers complained that hedgehogs had stripped the bark from their young trees.
Note
- 3A rich chocolate slice, much like a brownie.
Like a brownie, but with crushed cookies mixed in.
She cut the hedgehog into neat squares for the school fair.
A thick slice of hedgehog sat beside my coffee.
Note
- 4
- 5To cover something with sharp spikes that stick out in all directions.
Like sticking lots of pins into a ball so they point everywhere.
Engineers hedgehog the old wall with metal spikes to keep birds away.
They hedgehogged the fence with broken glass and nails.
Similarstud
Note
- 6A party snack made by sticking cheese and pineapple on small sticks into half a melon.
Like a melon turned into a ball of food on sticks.
Mom set a cheese-and-pineapple hedgehog in the middle of the table.
The kids pulled every stick off the hedgehog within minutes.
- 7A person who sees the world through one big main idea.
Like someone who has just one key and tries it on every door.
My uncle is a hedgehog, and every conversation comes back to his one big theory.
A hedgehog sees all of life through a single rule.
Oppositefox
Note
- 8Ellipsis of Czech hedgehog. Use it for the metal anti-tank barrier made of crossed beams.
Engineers welded another hedgehog from old rails and set it on the bridge approach.
A single hedgehog can stop a tank dead on a narrow road.
Note
- 9A World War II ship weapon that fired many small bombs into the sea to hit submarines.
Like throwing a handful of stones ahead of you so at least one hits.
The destroyer fired its hedgehog at the diving submarine.
Each hedgehog threw two dozen small bombs into the water.
Note
- 10An edible wild mushroom with soft spines under its cap instead of gills.
Like a mushroom with a soft brush of spines under its cap.
We found a hedgehog growing under the pine trees.
She fried the hedgehog in butter for lunch.
Note
- 11To defend a position from every side at once, like a barricade of spikes.
Like rolling into a spiky ball so no one can grab you from any side.
The troops will hedgehog around the hilltop tonight.
They hedgehogged in the village and held off every attack.
Note
- 12A kind of machine used to scoop mud and waste from the bottom of rivers.
Like a big underwater scoop that pulls mud up from the bottom.
The crew lowered the hedgehog to clear the harbor floor.
An old hedgehog dragged sand from the river all summer.
Note
- 13An old type of electrical transformer whose iron wires stick out and look spiky.
Like a bundle of wires with the loose ends spread out like spikes.
The lab still keeps an old hedgehog on the shelf.
Engineers replaced the hedgehog with a modern closed-core transformer.
- 14A type of curve studied in advanced geometry, made from many straight lines.
Like a curve drawn by lots of straight lines crossing each other.
The student drew a hedgehog for the geometry assignment.
A hedgehog can have sharp points called cusps.
Note
- 15A clover-like plant whose seed pods are covered in short spines.
Like a small plant whose seed cases are covered in tiny prickles.
The hedgehog grew wild along the dry hillside.
She pricked her finger on a hedgehog pod.
- 16A stiff-leaved shrub that grows in South Africa.
The hedgehog grows on dry mountain slopes in South Africa.
Gardeners can grow a hedgehog from seed if the soil stays sandy.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
Can you tell the meanings of hedgehog apart? Answer 3 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.
Origin
From Middle English heyghoge, made from hedge + hog. The philosophical meaning comes from Isaiah Berlin's 1953 essay The Hedgehog and the Fox.