The plural of "moose" is ...

[Victor Steinbok]

  Well, there is one other context where not much distinction between
singular and plural--meat. Aside from the Big Three that have special
words--beef, pork, venison (also veal and, perhaps, mutton)--other meats
(and sea creatures) do not take a plural marker: chicken, duck, goose,
pheasant, guinea fowl, quail, lamb, goat, fish, lobster, crab, squid,
cuttlefish, shrimp, kangaroo, squirrel, possum, raccoon, ostrich, emu,
moose are what's for dinner, even if multiple dishes, species and
carcasses are being prepared.  Buffalo is a special case (one could
argue that so are fish and shrimp). But: eggs, ants, grasshoppers,
pullets, etc. (and calamari, of course). Does it mean that when we talk
about "meat" we use the adjectival form, cropping the word "meat" or
something similar (filet, steak)? Or might there be another reason?

     VS-)

On 8/30/2010 7:56 PM, Chris Waigl wrote:
> On 21 Aug 2010, at 15:03, ronbutters at AOL.COM wrote:
>> In contexts other than hunting (and/or ducks), does one often/rarely
>> find a plural without the plural form, as for the word "fish"?  (I
>> suspect this is virtually impossible to search for via Google.)
>>
>> Chris
>
> I was reminded of this discussion when I came across this opening sentence of a NYT article today:
>
>
> ====
> Federal inspections of the two Iowa egg farms at the heart of a nationwide recall and salmonella outbreak found widespread safety problems, including barns infested with flies, maggot and rodents, the Food and Drug Administration said Monday.
> http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/31/business/31eggs.html?_r=1&hp
> ====

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