pillworm

pillworm noun: any myriapod which rolls up for protection; a galleyworm.

Noun

pillworm (plural pillworms)

(rare) Any myriapod which rolls up for protection; a galleyworm.
- Another one (Armadillo rugulosus) is endowed with the power of rolling itself up in a ball like the "pill-worm" of the Old Country1904, Alexander Bathgate, Dunedin and Its Neighbourhood: A Short Account of Its ..., page 68
- Objects of the Scheme:—(1) To produce intra hissutum and hissutum barbadense hybrids (F₁₁) possessing resistance to blackarm, red leaf blight and pillworm besides having economic and agronomic values and suitable for growing as such or by budding on perennial of stocks.1956, Mysore Agricultural Calendar and Year Book, Mysore (India:State). Dept. of Agriculture, page 151

The PILLWORM is restless, aggressive, and nearly as destructive as, though more sophisticated than, the APHID.1961, African Violet Magazine, volume 15, page 71:
an event which happened years earlier had eaten away at the parish in his charge as a pillworm eats at a plant.1984, Suzanne Morris, Galveston, page 408:

From pill + worm.

What does pillworm mean?: Pillworm means any myriapod which rolls up for protection; a galleyworm.
How do you use pillworm in a sentence?: The PILLWORM is restless, aggressive, and nearly as destructive as, though more sophisticated than, the APHID.
What part of speech is pillworm?: Pillworm is a noun.
What is the plural of pillworm?: The plural of pillworm is pillworms.

Adapted from Wiktionary: pillworm (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “pillworm.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pillworm. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.