fish

Universal Words noun, verb noun (plural fish or fishes) HELPNOTE Fish is the usual plural form. The older form, fishes, can be used to refer to different kinds of fish. 1 [C] a creature that lives in water, breathes through GILLS, and uses FINS and a tail for swimming: They caught several fish. * tropical / marine / freshwater fish * shoals (= groups) of fish * a fish tank / pond * There are about 30000 species of fish in the world. * The list of endangered species includes nearly 600 fishes. * Fish stocks in the Baltic are in decline. * In the pool she could see little silvery fish darting around. seealsoCOARSEFISH, FLATFISH, SEAFISH, SHELLFISH, WETFISH 2 [U] the flesh of fish eaten as food: frozen / smoked / fresh fish * fish pie * The chef's fish dishes are his speciality. * Fish forms the main part of their diet. IDIOMS a fish out of water a person who feels uncomfortable or awkward because he or she is in surroundings that are not familiar have bigger / other fish to fry to have more important or more interesting things to do neither fish nor fowl neither one thing nor another: The hovercraft has always suffered from the fact that it is neither fish nor fowl. an odd / a queer fish (old-fashioned, BrE) a person who is slightly strange or crazy there are plenty more fish in the sea there are many other people or things that are as good as the one sb has failed to get moreatBIGadj., COLDadj., DIFFERENT, DRINKv. verb 1 [V] ~ (for sth) to try to catch fish with a hook, nets, etc: You can fish for trout in this stream. * The trawler was fishing off the coast of Iceland. 2 (go fishing) to spend time fishing for pleasure: Let's go fishing this weekend. 3 [VN] to try to catch fish in the area of water mentioned: They fished the loch for salmon. 4 [V+adv./prep.] to search for sth, using your hands: She fished around in her bag for her keys. PHRASALVERBS fish for sth to try to get sth, or to find out sth, although you are pretending not to: to fish for compliments / information fish sth/sb<->out (of sth) to take or pull sth/sb out of a place: She fished a piece of paper out of the pile on her desk. * They fished a dead body out of the river.