What does mayfly mean?

Definitions for mayfly
ˈmeɪˌflaɪmayf·ly

This dictionary definitions page includes all the possible meanings, example usage and translations of the word mayfly.

Princeton's WordNet

  1. mayfly, dayfly, shadflynoun

    slender insect with delicate membranous wings having an aquatic larval stage and terrestrial adult stage usually lasting less than two days

Wiktionary

  1. mayflynoun

    Any of many fragile insects, of the order Ephemeroptera, that develop in fresh water, and live very briefly as adults.

Wikipedia

  1. Mayfly

    Mayflies (also known as shadflies or fishflies in Canada and the upper Midwestern United States, as Canadian soldiers in the American Great Lakes region, and as up-winged flies in the United Kingdom) are aquatic insects belonging to the order Ephemeroptera. This order is part of an ancient group of insects termed the Palaeoptera, which also contains dragonflies and damselflies. Over 3,000 species of mayfly are known worldwide, grouped into over 400 genera in 42 families. Mayflies have ancestral traits that were probably present in the first flying insects, such as long tails and wings that do not fold flat over the abdomen. Their immature stages are aquatic fresh water forms (called "naiads" or "nymphs"), whose presence indicates a clean, unpolluted and highly oxygenated aquatic environment. They are unique among insect orders in having a fully winged terrestrial preadult stage, the subimago, which moults into a sexually mature adult, the imago. Mayflies "hatch" (emerge as adults) from spring to autumn, not necessarily in May, in enormous numbers. Some hatches attract tourists. Fly fishermen make use of mayfly hatches by choosing artificial fishing flies that resemble them. One of the most famous English mayflies is Rhithrogena germanica, the fisherman's "March brown mayfly".The brief lives of mayfly adults have been noted by naturalists and encyclopaedists since Aristotle and Pliny the Elder in classical antiquity. The German engraver Albrecht Dürer included a mayfly in his 1495 engraving The Holy Family with the Mayfly to suggest a link between heaven and earth. The English poet George Crabbe compared the brief life of a daily newspaper with that of a mayfly in the satirical poem "The Newspaper" (1785), both being known as "ephemera".

ChatGPT

  1. mayfly

    A mayfly is a type of small, delicate insect known for its short lifespan. Belonging to the order Ephemeroptera, they are commonly found near water bodies as their nymph stage lives in water and adults are aquatic or semi-aquatic. Mayflies typically have a remarkable difference between immature and adult stages, with the adults often characterized by extremely brief life spans, sometimes lasting only a few hours. They are noted for the two or three long tail filaments often extending from the tip of the abdomen.

Wikidata

  1. Mayfly

    Mayflies or shadflies are insects belonging to the order Ephemeroptera. They have been placed into an ancient group of insects termed the Palaeoptera, which also contains dragonflies and damselflies. They are aquatic insects whose immature stage usually lasts one year in fresh water. The adults are short-lived, from a few minutes to a few days, depending on the species. About 2,500 species are known worldwide, including about 630 species in North America.

Suggested Resources

  1. mayfly

    Song lyrics by mayfly -- Explore a large variety of song lyrics performed by mayfly on the Lyrics.com website.

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Numerology

  1. Chaldean Numerology

    The numerical value of mayfly in Chaldean Numerology is: 9

  2. Pythagorean Numerology

    The numerical value of mayfly in Pythagorean Numerology is: 1

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"mayfly." Definitions.net. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 24 Apr. 2024. <https://www.definitions.net/definition/mayfly>.

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    the transportation of people (as a family or colony) to a new settlement (as after an upheaval of some kind)
    A rapture
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