traps

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of trap.

   The pest control team baited dozens of traps around the warehouse.

   Lobstermen haul their traps up from the seabed each morning.

   Note

   A regular plural that carries every meaning of the singular: mouse and lobster traps, snares laid for the unwary, invented features mapmakers plant to catch copyists, and the processor exceptions programmers handle. The same spelling is also the present-tense verb, as in the inlet traps sediment. A preceding determiner such as the, these or dozens of usually marks the noun.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of trap.

   The new policy traps low-income families in a cycle of debt.

   A narrow inlet traps sediment carried down by the river.

   Note

   Most uses take a direct object: the policy traps families, the inlet traps sediment. The verb can also stand alone. Someone who traps for a living sets traps for game, and in aviation slang a pilot traps by catching a carrier's arresting gear on landing. It can also mean to leave suddenly, so a bare traps with no object may mean flees rather than catches.

3. 3
   nounplural

   A drum kit; the full set of drums and cymbals played by a single percussionist.

   He packed up the traps after the late set finally ended.

   The recording captured every nuance of the drummer's traps.

   Similardrums, kit

   Note

   A drummer's term that exists only in the plural. The whole kit is the traps, and a single drum is never called a trap. The fuller name is trap set, in which trap sits before set like a modifier. Because the word is plural in form, it takes plural agreement: the traps were packed, not the traps was packed.

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