Runt

Runt

In a group of animals (usually a litter of animals born in multiple births), a runt is a member which is smaller and/or weaker than the others. [http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?runt] . Due to its small size, a runt in a litter faces some disadvantages, including difficulty in competing with its siblings for survival and possible rejection from its mother. Therefore, in the wild, a runt is less likely to survive to infancy. Rellington Vagner was one of the first Biologists to study this phenomenon in his work "Parental-Offspring Relations". Even among domestic animals, runts often face rejection. A runt may be a parent's way of 'hedging its bets'—if food is plentiful, it gets an extra offspring, if not, it lets it die having invested little in it in the first place. This may generate parent-offspring conflict.

In literature

* Wilbur the pig from "Charlotte's Web" is a runt.

* Shade the bat from "Silverwing" is a runt.

* Fiver from "Watership Down" is a runt.

* Clifford the Big Red Dog is a runt when he is born, but he eventually grows to be 25 feet tall.

* Ruth from the Dragonriders of Pern series is a runt.

* Jock was the runt of a litter of Staffordshire Bull Terriers who was saved from drowning by Sir Percy Fitzpatrick, who later wrote about his life with the dog in Jock of the Bushveld.

ee also

*Siblicide


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • runt — runt; runt·ed; runt·i·ness; runt·ish; se·de·runt; runt·ish·ly; runt·ish·ness; …   English syllables

  • Runt — Runt, n. [Written also {rant}.] [Scot. runt an old cow, an old, withered woman, a hardened stem or stalk, the trunk of a tree; cf. D. rund a bullock, an ox or cow, G. rind. Cf. {Rother}, a.] 1. (Zo[ o]l.) Any animal which is unusually small, as… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • runt — [rʌnt] n [Date: 1500 1600; Origin: Perhaps from Dutch rund cow, small ox ] 1.) the smallest and least developed baby animal of a group born at the same time runt of ▪ the runt of the litter 2.) informal a small, unpleasant, or unimportant person …   Dictionary of contemporary English

  • runt|y — «RUHN tee», adjective, runt|i|er, runt|i|est. unusually small; undersized; stunted; dwarfish …   Useful english dictionary

  • runt — c.1500, old or decayed tree stump, of unknown origin. Meaning extended to small ox or cow (1540s) and by 1610s to other animals and people. Specific Amer.Eng. sense of smallest of a litter (especially of pigs) is attested from 1841. Some see a… …   Etymology dictionary

  • runt — [runt] n. [< ?] 1. a stunted, undersized, or dwarfish animal, plant, thing, or (usually in a contemptuous sense) person 2. the smallest animal of a litter runtiness n. runty adj. runtier, runtiest …   English World dictionary

  • runt — [ rʌnt ] noun count 1. ) the smallest and weakest animal of a LITTER (=a group born at the same time) 2. ) OFFENSIVE someone who is small or weak …   Usage of the words and phrases in modern English

  • runt — • runt, cirka, omkring, ungefär, avrundat …   Svensk synonymlexikon

  • runt — *dwarf, pygmy, midget, manikin, homunculus …   New Dictionary of Synonyms

  • runt — [n] very small person half pint*, homunculus, Lilliputian, midget, peewee*, punk*, shrimp*; concept 424 …   New thesaurus

  • runt — ► NOUN ▪ a small pig or other animal, especially the smallest in a litter. DERIVATIVES runtish adjective runty adjective. ORIGIN originally in the sense «old or decayed tree stump», later «small ox or cow»: of unknown origin …   English terms dictionary

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