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water rats

water rats is the plural of water rat.

Meaning of water rat

Noun

water rat (plural water rats)

  1. (US) Any of various aquatic or semi-aquatic rodents from Florida and southern Georgia, especially Neofiber alleni; the muskrat.
    • Otters are even harder to spot; the coypu, a North American water rat, is more commonly seen.2004, James McConnachie, Rough Guide to the Loire, page 43
  2. (Australia) A water mouse, especially, the rakali, Hydromys chrysogaster.
    • "There [...] you will find the water-hole that is sacred to Biggoon, the giant water rat."1943, H. Lorna Bingham, The Lost Tribe, Sydney: Winn and Co., page 11, column 1
  3. (informal) A European water vole (Arvicola amphibius, formerly Arvicola terrestris).
  4. (US, slang) A petty thief or waterfront ruffian.
  5. (slang) A person fond of water sports.
  6. (Australia, slang) A member of the water police.

Questions about water rats

What is water rats the plural of?
Water rats is the plural of water rat.

Words near water rats in the dictionary

  1. water rail
  2. water rails
  3. water ram
  4. water rams
  5. water rat
  6. water rats
  7. water repellent
  8. water repellents
  9. water ribbons
  10. water right
  11. water rights

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: water rats (page history and authors); water rat (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.

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