poultry

poultry — noun

1. birds on a farm, including ducks, geese, and chickens, that people keep for eggs

1.nounB2
Definition

birds on a farm, including ducks, geese, and chickens, that people keep for eggs or food

Example

Farmers raise poultry behind the red barn near Tainan.

collocation: raise poultry

The school keeps poultry so students can collect fresh eggs.

purpose: keep poultry for eggs

Common collocations
  • raise poultry
  • keep poultry
  • poultry farm
  • poultry shed
Synonyms
  • fowl

    More formal or technical, and often less common in everyday speech.

  • domestic birds

    A broader phrase that can include birds not raised mainly for meat or eggs.

Usage Note

Usually treated as an uncountable group noun. Common in farming and food-production contexts, not for one individual bird.

Common Mistakes

There are many poultries on the farm.
There is a lot of poultry on the farm.
'poultry' is usually uncountable when it means birds as a group.

2. food made from farm birds such as chicken, duck, or goose

2.nounB2
Definition

food made from farm birds such as chicken, duck, or goose

Example

We bought fresh poultry for the hot pot dinner tonight.

collocation: fresh poultry

This soup uses poultry instead of beef or pork.

Common collocations
  • fresh poultry
  • raw poultry
  • grilled poultry
  • store poultry safely
Synonyms
  • chicken

    Often the everyday meat word, but it names one kind of poultry rather than the whole category.

  • white meat

    A cooking term that overlaps with poultry but does not cover every case exactly.

Usage Note

Usually uncountable in cooking, menus, and food-safety advice. Distinguish from sense 1, which names the live birds rather than the meat.

Common Mistakes

I bought a poultry for dinner.
I bought some poultry for dinner.
when it means the meat, 'poultry' is usually uncountable.

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

For sense 1, poultry is the general word for chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, and similar birds that people keep for eggs or meat. Chicken is much narrower: it usually names one type of bird, not the whole group. Fowl can overlap with poultry, but it often sounds more formal, technical, or old-fashioned. Livestock is broader than all of them, because it includes larger farm animals such as cows, pigs, and sheep as well as poultry. So a farm report may discuss poultry numbers, a cook may say chicken is cheaper this week, and an agriculture class may study poultry separately from other livestock.

chicken ↗fowllivestock ↗

Etymology

LatinOld FrenchEnglish

English got poultry from an Old French word for young domestic birds. That French word was built from poulet, meaning a young chicken, and it goes back to Latin pullus, a word for a young animal or chick. In English, the meaning later settled on birds raised for eggs or meat, and also the meat from those birds.