rainbow smelt

Questions about rainbow smelt

What does rainbow smelt mean?

rainbow smelt means "common smelt of eastern North America and Alaska". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for rainbow smelt?

Close synonyms include American smelt, Osmerus mordax. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is rainbow smelt a common word?

rainbow smelt is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.