crotch

noun

1. 1

   The ventral area (very bottom) of the human body between where the legs fork from the torso, in the area of the genitals and anus.

   Every mile they rode their crotches felt worse saddlepain.

   We were turned at a slight angle to each other, our shoulders touching and I put my hand on his crotch. Miles seemed to be expecting it. He chuckled, took a pair of compasses and jammed them into the door above the latch. This was called ‘sporting the oak’ and was the recognized way of locking oneself in. Over the next eighteen months we sported our oaks with great frequency.

2. 2

   slangEither the male or female genitalia.

   He cringed at being kicked in the crotch.

3. 3

   The area where something forks or branches: where a ramification takes place.

   There is a child sitting in a crotch of that tree.

   In one crotch of the old peach-tree, just by the wall, sat a second cousin of the little eight-eyed fellow we had left up stairs, with her web spread on the most geometric model, and a young and promising family of spiders and spideresses practising gymnastics in the fairy rigging; […]

   Tarzan wondered if he would stalk him to his cabin door. He hoped not, for that would mean a night’s sleep curled in the crotch of a tree, and he much preferred the bed of grasses within his own abode. But he knew just the tree and the most comfortable crotch, if necessity demanded that he sleep out.

4. 4

   In the three-ball carom game, a small space at each corner of the table.

5. 5

   The open counter (negative space) formed by two downward strokes that meet at an internal acute angle, potentially above a vertex, as in the letters "V" and "Y".

verb

1. 1

   To provide with a crotch; to give the form of a crotch to.

   to crotch the ends of ropes in splicing or tying knots

2. 2

   historicalTo notch (a log) on opposite sides to provide a grip for the dogs that will haul it.

3. 3

   To shoplift or smuggle by hiding between one's thighs or in one's underwear.

   I remember crotching a bottle of Corona out of a pub on Commercial Drive and nursing it with Cancer as we stumbled towards my car .

   I crotched them. I put them in my underwear.

   Techniques used: the woman rolled four coats and crotched them (placed them under her dress and held them between her thighs), and each of the men wrapped three coats around his midsection

4. 4

   To hit in the crotch (genital region).

   Flair and Paisley flirted until Daffney crotched David from behind with a baseball bat.

   Pillman gets crotched on the top rope and barely kicks out of a superplex.

   Calhoun turns around and Leo is facing him and he crotched him.

5. 5

   To secure (the boom) to the boom crotch (a forked pole).

   […] when she begins to go astern, let go the anchor, brail up the spanker, crotch the boom, haul taut the guys, light-to the cable, as fast as she will take it, until a sufficient scope is out, when stopper.

   I always crotched the boom while reefing, and made an easy job of it, the boat, in the meantime, taking perfect care of herself on any point of sailing, under jib and jigger.

   The big coiled throat and peak halyards were made ready to run, and the mainsheet was put to the winch ready for crotching the boom.

6. 6

   To hang (a rope) over a crotch in a tree so that the ends hang down from opposite sides.

   The safety sling should be tied immediately after the climber has crotched his rope as high and as close to the trunk as possible.

   If it is necessary, however, to climb directly onto the limb where the rope is crotched, the limb may be approached as shown in Figure 32.

   The climbing line shall be crotched as soon as practicable after the employee is aloft, and a taut-line hitch tied and checked.

7. 7

   To remove overgrown wool from around the eyes of.

   Cattle and sheep purchased by contract for a specific consignee at point of origin, and moving on through billing to points beyond Denver, may be stopped at Denver to be weighed, classified, sorted, inspected, delivered, tagged, faced, crotched, and/or diverted for a charge of $7.50 per car or per truck in lieu of yardage.

   My father crotched the ewes before they gave birth, and then played midwife to entire flocks once they started lambing in late April, often with the help of Rusyn peasants who knew just when to show up every year and who seemed fond of my tall, independent father.

   He was meant to be crotching the sheep that day, and crotching, as is well known in rural circles, is very thirsty work.

   If you can get your mob marked, crotched and over to Wilga by then, they can be done with mine.

Forms

plural

crotches

past tense

crotched

past participle

crotched

present participle

crotching

third person singular

crotches