rock hound
rock hound noun: a person who collects rocks and minerals from the natural environment as a hobby.
Noun
rock hound (plural rock hounds)
- A person who collects rocks and minerals from the natural environment as a hobby.
Forms of rock hound
| plural | rock hounds |
|---|
Origin of rock hound
In use by 1910s (see Citations). Originally a playful term for geologists employed in the early days of the oil industry - other similar names included "sand smeller", "oil witch", "wrinkle chaser", "pebble pup". The intended parallel being the likeness of a geologist sniffing out - like a hound - something of value among the rocks. Term popularized perhaps by a 1921 story published in Cosmopolitan titled The Rockhound.
Words formed from rock hound
Questions about rock hound
- What does rock hound mean?
- Rock hound means a person who collects rocks and minerals from the natural environment as a hobby.
- What part of speech is rock hound?
- Rock hound is a noun.
- What is the plural of rock hound?
- The plural of rock hound is rock hounds.
Words near rock hound in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: rock hound (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-rock hound.ogg.
Cite this entry: “rock hound.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/rock_hound. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.