ranging

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of range.

   The survey logged species ranging from tiny beetles to large mammals.

   Cattle were ranging freely across the open grassland all summer.

   Note

   Two families of meaning share this form. One is movement over ground: cattle ranging across open grassland. The other is span: things ranging from one extreme to another, as Kevin Heng (2013) describes exoplanets running from sub-Earth-sized minions to gas giants. In that second use the participle usually follows its noun directly, standing in for a clause like "that range." As a gerund it shades into the noun for roaming, which alone takes a plural.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act of moving or wandering freely over a wide area.

   Years of ranging across the plains had made the scouts expert trackers.

   The herd's constant ranging covered miles of grassland each day.

   Similarroaming, wandering, roving

   Note

   In the plural it names a set of excursions rather than a habit of movement. Patricia Riles Wickman's The Tree that Bends (1999) writes of a warrior class's "sexual rangings in pursuit of extratribal wives." Used as an uncountable noun, the word means the roaming itself. Used as a countable noun, rangings works much like wanderings, and it often has a purpose attached.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   A back-and-forth movement from one point to another and back again.

   The ranging of the ship in heavy seas tossed everything in the cabin.

   Her eyes followed the ranging of the metronome's arm.

   Similarswaying, swinging, oscillation

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