▪ I. clucking, vbl. n.
(ˈklʌkɪŋ)
[f. cluck v. + -ing1.]
The action of the vb. cluck.
| 1580 Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong., Glossement, a clucking. 1687 A. Lovell tr. Bergerac's Com. Hist. i. 39 The terrible clucking of the Toads. 1725 Bradley Fam. Dict. s.v. Poultry, You must reject all those Hens, notwithstanding their Clucking. 1865 Farrar Language 44 The Fuegians, whose language is an inarticulate clucking. 1872 Darwin Emotions xii. 286 The Australians often evince astonishment by a clucking noise. 1881 Echo 17 Jan. 4/2 Grouse..will shortly begin pairing. We have heard the ‘cluck-clucking’ of the cocks already. |
▪ II. clucking, ppl. a.
(ˈklʌkɪŋ)
[f. as prec. + -ing2.]
That clucks; clucking-hen, a. a hen that clucks, hence a brooding or sitting hen, a clocker.
| 1804 T. Bewick Brit. Birds (1847) II. 223 They are heard in croaking, clucking converse. 1847 Emerson Poems, Woodnotes Wks. (Bohn) I. 429 Clucking hens, and prating fools. 1871 Carlyle in Mrs. C.'s Lett. I. 121 A clucking hen..sitting safe in its hand-basket. |
b. A West Indian Rail (Aramus scolopaceus).
| 1847 Gosse Birds Jamaica 355 The Clucking Hen derives its provincial name from its ordinary voice. 1860 ― Romance Nat. Hist. 18 The harsh screams of the clucking-hen came up from a gloomy górge. |