aardvark

Everyday

1. An African mammal with a long snout, long ears, a thick tail and strong claws, which digs into ant and termite nests at night and eats the insects with its long sticky tongue. tree →
2. It lives in burrows and comes out mostly at night. tree →

In the lessons

In science lessons it is an example of an animal adapted to its food: claws for digging, a long tongue for catching termites, good hearing and smell for night life. In dictionaries it is often one of the first words. Its name comes from Afrikaans and means «earth pig», though it is not a pig.

Examples

• The aardvark dug into the termite mound with its claws. tree →
• An aardvark can eat thousands of ants in one night. tree →
• Aardvarks sleep in burrows during the day. tree →
• «Aardvark» is one of the first words in the dictionary. tree →
• The aardvark's long ears help it hear insects. tree →
• At the zoo we only saw the aardvark in the nocturnal house. tree →

Note

Use «an aardvark» (starts with a vowel sound). Spelled with double a. It is not an anteater; anteaters live in South and Central America and are a different animal. Not a pig, despite the name.