mutton-birdern.
/ˈmʌt(ə)nbəːdə/, U.S. /ˈməd(ə)nˌbərdər/, Australian English /ˈmʌt(ə)nbɜːdə/, /ˈmʌd(ə)nbɜːdə/, New Zealand English /ˈmʌd(ə)nbɜːdə/ Australian and New Zealand.
A person who catches mutton-birds or prepares their carcasses for sale.
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the world > food and drink > hunting > fowling > fowler > [noun] > using snare or net > trapper of specific birds
lark-catcher1618
larker1634
sparrower1830
mutton-birder1881
birder1918
1881 G. Walch Victoria in 1880 49 Armed with a piece of stout curved wire, fastened at the end of a long stick, the mutton-birder fishes in the holes for his prize.
1890 Otago Witness (Dunedin, N.Z.) 17 Apr. 19 The occupants of the boat were..mutton birders.
1917 Trans. & Proc. N.Z. Inst. 1916 49 168 There has been some clearing round the mutton-birders' huts.
1937 T. L. Buick Moa-hunters N.Z. 194 This method of preserving the flesh of birds is closely akin to that followed to-day by the mutton-birders on the southern islands.
1965 Austral. Encycl. VI. 234B (caption) A mutton-birder's hut, with casks of dressed and salted mutton-bird carcasses.
1986 Mercury (Hobart) 26 Mar. 39/2 I hereby issue a general authority to licensed mutton birders to take mutton birds..March 29 to April 15, 1986.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1881