proboscis
Example Sentences
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The hummingbird hawk moth, known for its furry grey body, orange hindwings and long proboscis, migrates to the UK from southern Europe and north Africa in the summer months.
From BBC ● Sep. 19, 2026
She introduces us to the Ugly Animal Preservation Society, an organization whose remit is to raise awareness and support for creatures such as the proboscis monkey and the blobfish.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 30, 2026
When a mosquito bites you, it pierces the skin using a mouthpart called a proboscis to suck up blood.
From Seattle Times ● May 25, 2024
It is known that hummingbird hawk moths use visible patterns on the flowers, which they scan with their proboscis to get to the sugary liquid faster.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 29, 2024
The proboscis of the death’s-head hawk moth is used as a kind of reed instrument, blown through to make high-pitched, reedy notes.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
Again, this seems incompatible with the presence of a trunk, as if sauropods had proboscides, wouldn’t they be grabbing foliage with the trunk tip, and then passing it into the mouth, over the teeth?
From Scientific American ● Nov. 20, 2012
Mammals with proboscides or inferred proboscides – I’m thinking tapirs, pyrotheres, astrapotheres, the stem-whale Makaracetus, some amynodontid rhinos, some oreodonts, Macrauchenia, dik-diks, saigas, desmans, sengis and so on – have narrow snouts.
From Scientific American ● Nov. 20, 2012
As we’ll see, and as is obvious if you look at the proboscides of extant mammals, there’s a lot more to having a trunk that having large, dorsally located nostrils.
From Scientific American ● Nov. 20, 2012
Naturally there will be mercantile proboscides dipping here and there, gleaning a little honey for the sweetening of the pots.
From Time Magazine Archive
They will work away with their forceps at a bit of sweetmeat, but they can absorb only liquids through their proboscides.
From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 94, August, 1865 by Various
"During our nighttime scuba dives, we searched for the ribbon-like proboscises of Bonellia sp aff minor extending out from burrow entrances," says lead author Ryutaro Goto at KyotoU's Field Science Education and Research Center.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 18, 2023
The Malagasy moths take the prize here, with proboscises that measure 6.6 centimeters longer on average, as seen in the picture above.
From Science Magazine ● Oct. 1, 2021
The insects bite into leaves with their mandibles and proboscises to induce flowering up to one month earlier than normal.
From Nature ● May 21, 2020
The bees soon cut several holes in the leaves of each plant using their mandibles and proboscises.
From Scientific American ● May 21, 2020
Two of the creatures had dropped upon his oily hair, to sip the rancid oil through their disgusting proboscises.
From The Mad Planet by Murray Leinster
Vocabulary lists containing proboscis
Gross, Anatomy!
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This Week In Culture: September 28–October 4, 2019
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Animals (Zoology) - Middle School
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