devil screecher

English

Etymology

From the bird's piercing cry.

Noun

devil screecher (plural devil screechers)

  1. (archaic, UK) A swift.
    • 1883, Edgar MacCulloch, “Notes, Queries, Notices and News”, in The Folk-Lore Journal, volume 1, number 12, page 394:
      My informant seemed to look upon the swift as an uncanny bird, and called it by a name I had never heard before, devil-screecher.
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