Even in the absence of a daily cycle of light and dark, the authors report in Current Biology, the roosters continued to crow near dawn, suggesting that the birds’ racket is indeed controlled by an internal clock. To see whether roosters simply crow in response to external stimuli or according to a circadian rhythm - an internally driven, cyclical pattern of behavior that occurs over a 24-hour period - the team put one group of birds into a room with continuously dim lights and tracked the birds’ crowing over the course of a month. Now, Japanese scientists have quite literally shed light on the phenomenon. After all, a rooster is rarely shy about making his presence known regardless of the time of day. The male, though generally smaller than the female, has the highest flavour in the body his flesh is firmer, and the colour, when boiled, is redder.‘Cock-a-doodle-doo!’ Study reveals what roosters have to crow about.Īlthough the rooster’s strident wake-up call just before sunrise feels as regular as an alarm clock, the evidence that the birds are somehow driven to herald the dawn has long been anecdotal. The cock-lobster is known by the narrow back-part of his tail the two uppermost fins within his tail are stiff and hard, but those of the hen are soft, and the tail broader.

French has parallel expression coq-à-l'âne.Ĭock-lobster 'male lobster' is attested by 1757. Cock-and-bull in reference to a fictitious narrative sold as true is first recorded 1620s, perhaps an allusion to Aesop's fables, with their incredible talking animals, or to a particular story, now forgotten. Cock of the walk 'overbearing fellow, head of a group by overcoming opponents' is from 1855 ( cock in this sense is from 1540s). 1500, it was affixed to Christian names as a pet diminutive, as in Wilcox, Hitchcock, etc.Ī cocker spaniel (1823) was trained to start woodcocks. It became a general term for 'fellow, man, chap,' especially in old cock (1630s). Old English cocc was a nickname for 'one who strutted like a cock,' thus a common term in the Middle Ages for a pert boy, used of scullions, apprentices, servants, etc. 'Though at home in English and French, not the general name either in Teutonic or Romanic the latter has derivatives of L. Compare Albanian kokosh 'cock,' Greek kikkos, Sanskrit kukkuta, Malay kukuk. 'male of the domestic fowl,' from Old English cocc 'male bird,' Old French coc (12c., Modern French coq), Old Norse kokkr, all of echoic origin.

Cockadoodledoo meaning