porpoise

plural porpoises

1. A small cetacean of the family Phocoenidae, related to dolphins and whales.

   Near-synonyms: sea hog, sea pig, seaswine, mereswine

   1 more example

   They captured 25 porpoises and set them free back into the Yangtze after raising them for a month in Puqi County, Hubei.

   1991, Zhou Kaiya, Zhang Xingduan, translated by Luo Changyan, Baiji: The Yangtze River Dolphin and Other Endangered Animals of China, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 76

   Synonyms: phocoenid, sea hog, sea pig, seaswine, mereswine

2. CanadaUSbroadlyAny small dolphin.

present singular third person porpoises · participle present porpoising · participle past porpoised · past porpoised

1. intransitiveSaid of an air-breathing aquatic animal such as a porpoise or penguin: To repeatedly jump out of the water to take a breath and dive back in a continuous motion.

   Urging them to join me, I raced in circles through the surging water, chased my tail for the children, blew spouts of foam through the sunfilled spray, porpoised to and fro across the river in shallow leaps that stitched the air and water into a table-lace of foam.

   1979, J.G. Ballard, The Unlimited Dream Company, chapter 15

2. intransitiveSaid of an aircraft: to make a series of plunges when taking off or landing; or of a watercraft: to successively plunge up and down in the water.

   Synonyms: balloon