muck

views updated Jun 11 2018

muck / mək/ • n. dirt, rubbish, or waste matter: I'll just clean the muck off the windshield. ∎  farmyard manure, widely used as fertilizer. ∎ inf. something regarded as worthless, sordid, or corrupt: the muck that passes for music in the pop charts.• v. [tr.] 1. (muck up) inf. mishandle (a job or situation); spoil (something): she had mucked up her first few weeks at college.2. rare spread manure on (land).PHRASES: make a muck of chiefly Brit., inf. handle incompetently: it’s useless now that they’ve made a muck of it.PHRASAL VERBS: muck about/around chiefly Brit., inf. behave in a silly or aimless way, esp. by wasting time when serious activity is expected: he spent his summers mucking about in boats. ∎  (muck about/around with) spoil (something) by interfering with it: they did not want designers mucking about with their newspapers.ORIGIN: Middle English muk, probably of Scandinavian origin: compare with Old Norse myki ‘dung,’ from a Germanic base meaning ‘soft,’ shared by meek.

muck

views updated Jun 27 2018

muck
1. Highly decomposed organic matter in which original plant material cannot be recognized.

2. Farmyard manure (FYM) composed of animal faeces and urine mixed with straw and highly decomposed.

3. See muck soil.

muck

views updated Jun 08 2018

muck
1. Highly decomposed organic matter in which original plant material cannot be recognized
.
2. Farmyard manure (FYM) composed of animal faeces and urine mixed with straw and highly decomposed.

muck

views updated May 29 2018

muck dung XIII; dirt, filth XIV. prob. of Scand. orig. and — forms rel. to ON. myki, mykr dung, Da. møg, Norw. myk, f. Gmc. *muk- *meuk- soft (rel. to MEEK).