ˈice-bird Ornith.
1. The little auk or sea-dove.
| 1620 J. Mason New-found-land (1867) A iv b, The sea fowles are Sea Pigeons, Ice Birds, Bottle noses. 1694 Acc. Sev. Late Voy. ii. (1711) 78, I saw also..a very beautiful Ice⁓bird, which was so tame, that we might have taken him. 1777 G. Forster Voy. round World I. 110 A small black and white bird, which some called an ice-bird. 1802 G. Montagu Ornith. Dict. (1833) 267 Ice-bird, a name for the Rotche or Little Auk. |
2. The Indian night-jar, Caprimulgus asiaticus.
| 1862 T. C. Jerdon Birds India I. §112. 197 Its usual note..is like the sound of a stone scudding over ice (hence it is sometimes called the Ice-bird). |