A tract of shallow water, a lagoon. Also, a shallow pool or runnel formed by the overflow of a river, a backwater; a stream running across a road.

A side-stream or backwater.

U.S. and Canadian. A marshy or reedy pool, pond, small lake, backwater, or inlet.

In West Africa: a side channel of a river.

With other nouns, chiefly with the sense ‘lying or leading off from the main trunk, body, or area’, as in off-branch, off-corner, off-drain, off flow…

North American./sluː/. = slew, n.1 Also, a side channel of a river, or a natural channel that is only sporadically filled with water.

A side channel. Obsolete. rare.

A piece of water without current, lying more or less parallel to a river, and fed from it at the lower end by a back-flow.

A side-stream apart from the main channel; figurative a collateral branch (of a family).

A branch or effluent of a river, forming a blind channel, backwater, or stagnant pool.