rooster-tailv.
/ˈruːstəteɪl/, U.S. /ˈrustərˌteɪl/ North American colloquial.
1. intransitive. To travel at speed in such a way as to throw up a curved plume of water, gravel, snow, etc. Also (of water, gravel, snow, etc.): to rise or spray in the form of a curved plume. Cf. rooster tail n. 2.
ΚΠ
1957 Los Angeles Times 2 Jan. (Midwinter Suppl.) 84 Rooster-tailing along on Lake Mead, near Las Vegas, Miss Wayne tries for a speed record.
1989 AutoWeek (Nexis) 4 Sept. 50 We watched in awe as the cars roostertailed by at 160 mph or more.
1998 Antigonish Rev. Spring 39 Pulling back onto the highway, gravel rooster-tailing behind the car, I am fully awake again.
2001 Westworld (Brit. Columbia) (Nexis) Nov. We rooster-tailed onto a marked run.
2009 T. Pynchon Inherent Vice xx. 358 They were close enough now to see two..dark narrow shapes detach from the schooner..then go roostertailing away, their engines for a short while louder even than the crashing surf.
2. transitive. To throw up (water, gravel, snow, etc.) in the form of a curved plume.
ΚΠ
1981 J. McDonald Flight from Dhahran iv. 93 We slowed. The twin plumes of dust and dirt we'd been rooster-tailing behind the car as we sped along dropped.
1995 Press-Enterprise (Riverside, Calif.) (Nexis) 8 Aug. b1 Lean hard to the right, trying to touch your right elbow to the water, rooster tailing the spray from the back of your ski in a high arc.
2002 J. Eugenides Middlesex ii. 123 The engine thunders. Tire chains rooster-tail snow.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, November 2010; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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v.1957