thrip

Back-formation from thrips

thrip (plural thrips)

1. Optional singular for thrips, an insect of the order Thysanoptera.
   • 1994, M. D. Pathak, Zeyaur R. Khan, Insect Pests of Rice, page 47:

     S.^{[Stenchaetothrips]} biformis is also known as rice leaf thrip, paddy thrip, or oriental rice thrip.

   • 2000, Brian McAndrew, Niagara Parks Butterflies‎, page 49:

     A pair of local pests, the thrip and white fly, made their way into the greenhouse through the air vents and hitchhiked into the conservatory on plants. Without controls in place, each female thrip can reproduce 200 offspring every week.

   • 2004, Wendy Doucet, A Simple Plant Guide for Beginners and Maintenance Technicians, unnumbered page:

     Thrip are probably one of the hardest flies to actually see. The fecal deposits they leave on the underside of leaves are usually noticed long before the thrip itself.

   • 2008, Raymond A. Zilinskas, “Chapter 7: Cuban Allegations of U.S. Biological Warfare: False Accusations and Their Impact on Attribution”, in Anne Clunan, Peter Lavoy, Susan Martin, editors, Terrorism, War, or Disease?: Unraveling the Use of Biological Weapons, page 154:

     Nevertheless for the sake of discussion here, I posit a situation that engages experts and uses the thrip infestation as a hypothetical case study.

Oxford English Dictionary.