vagrate

present singular third person vagrates · participle present vagrating · participle past vagrated · past vagrated

1. biologyTo wander randomly before settling in a new place to live.

   There is scarcely any doubt, however, that a few do breed in the Carn districts, and that they vagrate out to surrounding hills.

   1895, John Alexander Harvie-Brown, Thomas E. Buckley, A Fauna of the Moray Basin - Volume 2, page 156

   3 more examples

   A moth that is possessed by the instinct to migrate (which is the wrong word; moths do not "migrate" as the zoologist knows migration; they "vagrate"), soars almost as soon as its wings are dry; the very first flight that it makes is the flight that carries it across the sea.

   1940, The Entomologist; Volumes 73-75, page 205

   The neonate larvae appear from mid-June to early July and vagrate to the leaves, where they settle, preferably on the lower side.

   1953, İstanbul Üniversitesi Fen Fakültesi Mecmuası

   Most western vagrants involve species that frequently vagrate to the East; the only exceptions are all from the Southwest: Broad-billed Hummingbird, Tropical/ Couch's Kingbird, and Cassin's Sparrow (DeSante & Pyle, 1986).

   2006, Laurence Charles Binford, Birds of the Keweenaw Peninsula, Michigan, page 220

2. To wander freely with no destination.

   Breathing is the bridge between the body and mind; it anchors the mind; it doesn't allow it to vagrate or to wander.

   2013, Silvio Canale, The Myth of Motivation: A Journey of Self Discovery, page 235

   2 more examples

   Sometimes one can hear long epic songs, sung in the past perhaps by songsters, who at present are not allowed to vagrate freely.

   1967, Annals of the Náprstek Museum - Volumes 3-6, page 165

   As far as you have observed the free people of colour, have they been disposed to vagrate, except for the purpose of procuring more profitable employment?

   1968, Irish University Press Series of British Parliamentary Papers: Slave Trade, page 29

3. To vary.

   The large spread of these potentials, however, seems to indicate that potentials in the dilute solutions of this series somehow vagrate within a fairly wide range.

   1956, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, Proceedings: Physical sciences. Series B - Volume 59, page 76

   1 more example

   Among these Kings occurs the renowned name of Ollamh Fodhla, as to the period of whose existence the fabulous historians have vagrated between 1300 and 600 years before Christ.

   1835, The Westminster Review - Volume 23, page 194