tails

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of tail.

   Lizards can drop their tails to escape predators.

   The aircraft were painted with the airline's logo on their tails.

   Note

   A regular plural, made simply by adding -s, and it covers every kind of tail: a lizard's, a bird's feathered one, the thongs of a cat-o'-nine-tails, the rear structure of an aircraft. The same spelling does a lot of other work. It is also a present-tense verb (she tails him), and it names a coat, a side of a coin and two kinds of leftover waste, each behaving as its own word.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The reverse of a coin, opposite the side that carries a head-of-state portrait or a comparable image.

   He guessed tails, but the coin came up heads instead.

   The referee tossed the coin, and the captain chose tails.

   Oppositeheads

   Note

   The call and the result in a coin toss, always paired with heads and usually said bare, without an article: "Tails, I win." Though plural in shape, it names a single outcome. You call tails, and the coin comes up tails. The plural simply mirrors heads, the portrait side, whose name this side takes its opposite from.

3. 3
   nounslangabbreviationclipping

   Clipping of tailcoat.

   The groom looked elegant in tails and a crisp white shirt.

   Waiters at the grand ball were dressed in tails.

   Note

   Evening dress cut down to a single word, and the word stays plural even for one coat: a man is in tails, never in a tail. It travels with the rest of the formal outfit, top hat and white tie, a set Irving Berlin put into a 1935 song title, Top Hat, White Tie and Tails. Though slang by origin, a clipping of tailcoat, it sits comfortably beside the formal clothes it names.

4. 4
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of tail.

   The unmarked car tails the truck across three counties.

   She tails her target quietly, staying half a block behind.

   Note

   The verb form that shares its spelling with the plain plural noun, so context decides which one is meant: a detective tails a suspect, but the dogs' tails wag. Besides following someone unseen, it carries older technical uses. A vessel at anchor tails when its stern swings round, and a timber tails into a wall when its end rests on it.

5. 5
   noun

   The waste material left over after the valuable portion has been extracted, especially in mining or processing.

   The company reprocessed its tails to extract leftover copper.

   Decades of tails had built up behind the processing plant.

   Similartailings, waste, residue

   Note

   Mining shorthand for tailings, the crushed residue left once the valuable mineral has been taken out. Tails is the clipped form and tailings the fuller term, and both turn up wherever ore is processed. Like the distiller's tails, it names the unwanted last stream of a separation, though here the waste is rock rather than spirit.

6. 6
   noun

   The final fraction collected during distillation, containing heavier compounds and generally separated from the desirable middle portion.

   Skilled distillers separate the tails to avoid harsh, oily flavors.

   The tails from the first run were saved for a second distillation.

   Similarfeints

   Oppositeheads

   Note

   Distillers divide a run into stages, and tails, also called feints, come off last, after the prized hearts. Bill Owens and Alan Dikty, in The Art of Distilling Whiskey and Other Spirits (2011), describe collecting tails until the distillate falls to about 10 percent. Because they carry heavier, harsher compounds, tails are kept apart from the hearts and often returned to a later run.

Showing meanings only. Show all 6