habitat
/ˈhæb.ɪ.tæt/ noun
Forms habitats
- noun (uncountable, biology) Conditions suitable for an organism or population of organisms to live. “This park offers important amphibian habitat and breeding area.”
- noun (countable, biology) A range; a place where a species naturally occurs.
- noun (countable, biology) A terrestrial or aquatic area distinguished by geographic, abiotic and biotic features, whether entirely natural or semi-natural.
- noun A place in which a person lives.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Latin habitat (“it dwells, lives”), the 3rd person singular present active indicative form of habitō (“to live or dwell”). In Linnaeus and similar authors, the geographical ranges of species were customarily denoted in Latin by a sentence beginning with "Habitat", e.g. "Habitat in Europa" ("It lives in Europe"), and it thus became the convention to refer to the geographical range as the "habitat". Compare the English derivations of exit, floruit, ignoramus, and tenet from Latin finite verbs reanalyzed as English nouns.
Webster’s 1913
- noun The natural abode, locality or region of an animal or plant.
- noun Place where anything is commonly found.
Etymology [L., it dwells, fr. habitare. See Habit, v. t.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “habitat”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details