terricole

comparative more terricole · superlative most terricole

1. Ground-dwelling or growing close to the ground.

   Man himself is terricole in habits, with vertical carriage, and walking on two feet.

   1896, Paul Carus, The Monist - Volume 6, page 36

   3 more examples

   The plant from Heald Brow is terricole, occurring on loose sandy calcareous earth about the entrances to rabbit-holes, in a very dry locality, Heald Brow being a dry hill on the scar-limestone.

   1916, Journal of Botany, British and Foreign, page 319

   The greatest bulk of the typical high altitude insects are generally small-sized, flightless or apterous, mostly heavily pigmented, terricole forms that occur under stones, in the immediate vicinity of glaciers, snow and melt waters.

   1963, Agra University Journal of Research: Science - Volume 12, page 171

   These peculiarities depend largely on the moisture requirements of the terricole species. In humid weather, the top layer of the soil is usually highly saturated and moist, so that the terricole species generally occur on the upper layers of the soil.

   2013, M.S. Mani, Ecology and Biogeography of High Altitude Insects, →ISBN, page 66

   Synonyms: terricolous

plural terricoles

1. Any insect that lives on or in the ground, especially one that is flightless.

   The Terricoles are the true Crane Flies, seen in damp meadows in great numbers, especially in the autumn.

   1863, Cassell's popular natural history - Volumes 3-4, page 247

   2 more examples

   Still another subdivision of terricoles consists of species of high alpine habitats with scanty and very short vegetation.

   1966, Sir Boris Petrovich Uvarov, Grasshoppers and locusts: a handbook of general acridology, page 379

   Two types of grasshoppers are common in desert grasslands: terricoles, or soil mimics (the color pattern matches soil or rocks), and graminicoles, or grass mimics (the color pattern matches grass leaves).

   1995, Mitchel P. McClaran, Thomas R. Van Devender, The Desert Grassland, page 169