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# gill

«gill» in Mova's school dictionary: **the body parts that fish and some other water animals use…** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 5 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### part of speech

noun (a gill, gills)

### meaning for a pupil

1) Gills are the body parts that fish and some other water animals use to breathe; they take oxygen from the water. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#m1)

2) Gills are also the thin lines under the cap of a mushroom. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#m2)

3) (old, informal) Gills can also mean a person's cheeks or face, as in "pale to the gills", meaning very pale with fear. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#m3)

### sense in the lessons

In science, fish, tadpoles, crabs and sharks breathe with gills, while whales and dolphins are mammals that breathe air with lungs. Water goes in through the mouth and out over the gills. Phrases: breathe through gills, green around the gills (looking sick).

### examples

- Fish breathe through their gills. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x1)
- Tadpoles have gills, but frogs have lungs. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x2)
- The shark's gills look like slits. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x3)
- Whales do not have gills. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x4)
- Look at the gills under the mushroom cap. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x5)
- Water flows over the gills to give oxygen. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x6)
- After the boat ride he looked green around the gills. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x7)
- A fish out of water cannot breathe with its gills. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x8)
- In that supreme moment Hook did not blanch, even at the gills, but Smee and Starkey clung to each other in terror. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/#x9)

### note

Usually plural: gills. Pronounced with a hard g, like «girl». A measure called a gill (with a soft g, «jill») is an old unit of liquid, rarely used. Trap: dolphins and whales have no gills.

### In the corpora

- [Tadpoles hatch after about 1 to 3 weeks, breathe with gills and swim with a tail, and grow faster in warmer water.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/48-life-cycles-metamorphosis/5/)
- [The octopus has three hearts and blue blood: two hearts pump blood through the gills and one through the body.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/298-the-big-biology-quiz-part-1-habitats-and-animals/14/)
- [Most fish take in oxygen dissolved in the water through their gills.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/17-air-oxygen-carbon-dioxide/16/)
- [Fish breathe with gills and most have fins and scales.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/24-animal-groups/9/)
- [Young amphibians usually live in water and breathe with gills; adults usually breathe with lungs and through their skin.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/24-animal-groups/12/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «gill» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/G/gill/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.