rafts

Noun

raft (plural rafts)

1. A flat-bottomed craft able to float and drift on water, used for transport or as a waterborne platform.
   • They floated down the river on an inflatable raft
2. (broadly) Any flattish thing, usually wooden, used in a similar fashion.
   • When George Stephenson built the Liverpool & Manchester Railway he encountered the same difficulty at Chat Moss and solved the problem by constructing a kind of raft made of brushwood that more or less floated on the surface of the bog. On this he placed as much firm soil as his raft could carry...1934 February, G. W. Tripp, “How Nature Harasses the Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 79
3. (collective) A thick crowd of aquatic birds, particularly a group floating on the surface of the water.
   • Pelicans, bills stuck forward, would gather in small rafts to move along in comical formation, before diving in unison […]2010, John Roome, A Persistent Passage, page 140
   1. (broadly, collective) A group of aquatic mammals, especially otters and especially when visible on the surface of the water.
      • A raft of otters at rest in the river.2019, Jennifer McCartney, The Little Book of Otter Philosophy, HarperCollins Publishers
   2. (collective) A group of alligators or crocodiles, especially when floating in water with their backs visible above the surface.
      • She even pointed out a bank where a raft of crocodiles lay dozing, baking their scaly backs in the sun.2010, Esther Friesner, Sphinx's Queen, Random House Children's Books
4. (US) A collection of logs, fallen trees, etc. which obstructs navigation in a river.

See all 14 meanings of raft