| ferret | | |
| n. (animal) | 1. black-footed ferret, ferret, mustela nigripes | musteline mammal of prairie regions of United States; nearly extinct. |
| ~ mustelid, musteline, musteline mammal | fissiped fur-bearing carnivorous mammals. |
| ~ genus mustela, mustela | type genus of the family Mustelidae: minks and weasels. |
| n. (animal) | 2. ferret | domesticated albino variety of the European polecat bred for hunting rats and rabbits. |
| ~ fitch, foulmart, foumart, mustela putorius, polecat | dark brown mustelid of woodlands of Eurasia that gives off an unpleasant odor when threatened. |
| v. (motion) | 3. ferret | hound or harry relentlessly. |
| ~ hound, hunt, trace | pursue or chase relentlessly.; "The hunters traced the deer into the woods"; "the detectives hounded the suspect until they found him" |
| v. (competition) | 4. ferret | hunt with ferrets. |
| ~ hunt, hunt down, track down, run | pursue for food or sport (as of wild animals).; "Goering often hunted wild boars in Poland"; "The dogs are running deer"; "The Duke hunted in these woods" |
| v. (cognition) | 5. ferret, ferret out | search and discover through persistent investigation.; "She ferreted out the truth" |
| ~ discover, find | make a discovery.; "She found that he had lied to her"; "The story is false, so far as I can discover" |
| search | | |
| n. (act) | 1. hunt, hunting, search | the activity of looking thoroughly in order to find something or someone. |
| ~ activity | any specific behavior.; "they avoided all recreational activity" |
| ~ exploration | a careful systematic search. |
| ~ foraging, forage | the act of searching for food and provisions. |
| ~ frisk, frisking | the act of searching someone for concealed weapons or illegal drugs.; "he gave the suspect a quick frisk" |
| ~ looking for, looking | the act of searching visually. |
| ~ manhunt | an organized search (by police) for a person (charged with a crime). |
| ~ seeking, quest | the act of searching for something.; "a quest for diamonds" |
| ~ ransacking, rummage | a thorough search for something (often causing disorder or confusion).; "he gave the attic a good rummage but couldn't find his skis" |
| ~ scouring | moving over territory to search for something.; "scouring the entire area revealed nothing" |
| ~ shakedown | a very thorough search of a person or a place.; "a shakedown by the police uncovered the drugs" |
| n. (act) | 2. search | an investigation seeking answers.; "a thorough search of the ledgers revealed nothing"; "the outcome justified the search" |
| ~ investigating, investigation | the work of inquiring into something thoroughly and systematically. |
| n. (process) | 3. lookup, search | an operation that determines whether one or more of a set of items has a specified property.; "they wrote a program to do a table lookup" |
| ~ operation | (computer science) data processing in which the result is completely specified by a rule (especially the processing that results from a single instruction).; "it can perform millions of operations per second" |
| n. (cognition) | 4. search | the examination of alternative hypotheses.; "his search for a move that would avoid checkmate was unsuccessful" |
| ~ hunt | an instance of searching for something.; "the hunt for submarines" |
| ~ pursuance, quest, pursuit | a search for an alternative that meets cognitive criteria.; "the pursuit of love"; "life is more than the pursuance of fame"; "a quest for wealth" |
| ~ higher cognitive process | cognitive processes that presuppose the availability of knowledge and put it to use. |
| n. (act) | 5. search | boarding and inspecting a ship on the high seas.; "right of search" |
| ~ examination, scrutiny | the act of examining something closely (as for mistakes). |
| v. (contact) | 6. look for, search, seek | try to locate or discover, or try to establish the existence of.; "The police are searching for clues"; "They are searching for the missing man in the entire county" |
| ~ dredge, drag | search (as the bottom of a body of water) for something valuable or lost. |
| ~ finger | search for on the computer.; "I fingered my boss and found that he is not logged on in the afternoons" |
| ~ fumble, grope | feel about uncertainly or blindly.; "She groped for her glasses in the darkness of the bedroom" |
| ~ divine | search by divining, as if with a rod.; "He claimed he could divine underground water" |
| ~ surf, browse | look around casually and randomly, without seeking anything in particular.; "browse a computer directory"; "surf the internet or the world wide web" |
| ~ leave no stone unturned | search thoroughly and exhaustively.; "The police left no stone unturned in looking for the President's murderer" |
| ~ hunt | seek, search for.; "She hunted for her reading glasses but was unable to locate them" |
| ~ gather | look for (food) in nature.; "Our ancestors gathered nuts in the Fall" |
| ~ want | hunt or look for; want for a particular reason.; "Your former neighbor is wanted by the FBI"; "Uncle Sam wants you" |
| ~ scour | examine minutely.; "The police scoured the country for the fugitive" |
| ~ seek out | look for a specific person or thing. |
| ~ quest after, quest for, go after, pursue | go in search of or hunt for.; "pursue a hobby" |
| ~ fish, angle | seek indirectly.; "fish for compliments" |
| ~ grub | search about busily. |
| ~ feel | grope or feel in search of something.; "He felt for his wallet" |
| ~ browse, shop | shop around; not necessarily buying.; "I don't need help, I'm just browsing" |
| v. (perception) | 7. look, search | search or seek.; "We looked all day and finally found the child in the forest"; "Look elsewhere for the perfect gift!" |
| ~ hunt | search (an area) for prey.; "The King used to hunt these forests" |
| ~ examine, see | observe, check out, and look over carefully or inspect.; "The customs agent examined the baggage"; "I must see your passport before you can enter the country" |
| ~ cruise | look for a sexual partner in a public place.; "The men were cruising the park" |
| ~ prospect | search for something desirable.; "prospect a job" |
| ~ horn in, nose, poke, intrude, pry | search or inquire in a meddlesome way.; "This guy is always nosing around the office" |
| v. (cognition) | 8. explore, research, search | inquire into.; "the students had to research the history of the Second World War for their history project"; "He searched for information on his relatives on the web"; "Scientists are exploring the nature of consciousness" |
| ~ prospect | explore for useful or valuable things or substances, such as minerals. |
| ~ google | search the internet (for information) using the Google search engine.; "He googled the woman he had met at the party"; "My children are googling all day" |
| ~ mapquest | search for a location and directions by means of the MapQuest program.; "you can just mapquest the restaurant" |
| ~ re-explore | explore anew.; "We need to re-explore Colonialism" |
| ~ beat about, cast about, cast around | search anxiously. |
| ~ investigate, look into | investigate scientifically.; "Let's investigate the syntax of Chinese" |
| v. (contact) | 9. search | subject to a search.; "The police searched the suspect"; "We searched the whole house for the missing keys" |
| ~ raid | search for something needed or desired.; "Our babysitter raided our refrigerator" |
| ~ frisk | search as for concealed weapons by running the hands rapidly over the clothing and through the pockets.; "The police frisked everyone at the airport" |
| ~ strip-search | search (someone) for weapons or drugs by having the person remove their clothes.; "He was strip-searched at the airport" |
| ~ scan | make a wide, sweeping search of.; "The beams scanned the night sky" |
| ~ rifle, go | go through in search of something; search through someone's belongings in an unauthorized way.; "Who rifled through my desk drawers?" |
| ~ rummage | search haphazardly.; "We rummaged through the drawers" |
| ~ comb, ransack | search thoroughly.; "They combed the area for the missing child" |
| ~ examine, see | observe, check out, and look over carefully or inspect.; "The customs agent examined the baggage"; "I must see your passport before you can enter the country" |
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