litter

noun

1. (uncountable)Straw, grass, and similar loose material used as bedding for people or animals.

   “Quen he had made me hale and fere”

   “As pelows ben to chambres agreable So is harde strawe lytter for the stable.”

   “To place daily under those Animals... a sufficient quantity of fresh New Straw, well spread, which is call'd making of Litter.”

   “John Baldwin held the manor of Oterarsee in Aylesbury of the king in soccage, by the service of finding litter for the king's bed, viz. in summer grass or herbs, and in winter straw.”

   “The afterwards dry the horsedung in the sun, beat it with a mallet through fine sieves, and make it into litter for the horses; for no straw can be obtained for litter in Constantinople.”

2. (countable, obsolete)Straw, grass, and similar loose material used as bedding for people or animals.

   “Near-synonyms: pallet, straw bed, hay bed (all broadly synonymous)”

   “The traitours sought the Kyng... yn the withdrawyng chaumburs, yn the litters, undir the presses.”

   “Tho laye they doun on a lytier made of strawe, the foxe, hys wyf and hys chyldren wente alle to slepe.”

   “They slept upon litters of jungle grasses, and for covering at night Jane Porter had only an old ulster that belonged to Clayton, the same garment that he had worn upon that memorable trip to the Wisconsin woods.”

3. (uncountable)Straw, grass, and similar loose material used as bedding for people or animals.

   “Silkworms... must be well cleansed from the litter.”

   “The heir of an estate... troubled himself little about decorating his abode, and, if he attempted decoration, seldom produced anything but deformity. The litter of a farmyard gathered under the windows of his bedchamber, and the cabbages and gooseberry bushes grew close to his hall door.”

4. (countable)A mobile bed or couch transported upon or suspended from poles placed over human shoulders or animal backs.

   “... In a lytter made tho full royall...”

   “Glou. There is a Litter ready, lay him in't, And driue toward Douer friend...”

5. (countable)A mobile bed or couch transported upon or suspended from poles placed over human shoulders or animal backs.

   “He ordeyned lyttyers for the wounded knyghtes.”

6. (broadly, countable)A mobile bed or couch transported upon or suspended from poles placed over human shoulders or animal backs.

   “When they went out, they sat in litters, which were curtained.”

   “"The Chengtu revolutionaries were fantastically colourful in the Szechwanese manner—they costumed themselves as heroes of the stage and their energies were chiefly occupied in tying ropes across the main streets so that when Imperial officials rode by in their litters they would have to get down and crawl under, losing face.”

7. (obsolete, uncountable)Synonym of straw, grass, etc. more generally, particularly in plaster, thatch, and mulch.
8. (countable, obsolete)An act of giving birth to a number of live young at the same time.

   “Let new planted Elms be kept moist by frequent refreſhings upon ſome half-rotten Fern, or Litter laid about the foot of the ſtem...”

9. (collective, countable)The whole group of live young born at the same time, typically in reference to mammals or (figurative, derogatory) unpleasant people or objects.

   “A Wolf came to a Sow, and very Kindly Offer'd to take care of her Litter.”

   “Strongly-marked differences occasionally appear in the young of the same litter.”

   “When a man had married into a family where there was a whole litter of women, he might have plenty to put up with if he choose.”

   “The runt of the litter is the smallest or weakest of a group of puppies born together.”

10. (uncountable)Waste or debris, originally any mess but now particularly trash left or thrown on the ground.

    “Near-synonyms: garbage; see also Thesaurus:trash”

    “What are you doing?! There's a litter bin not three feet away.”

    “Strephon, who found the room was void And Betty otherwise employed, Stole in and took a strict survey Of all the litter as it lay....”

    “The British people seem incapable of avoiding the habit of leaving litter wherever they go, and the railways certainly seem to receive their fair share of it, in carriages and on stations.”

    “In the case of a simple problem such as littering, the success or failure of a solution can immediately be assessed once and for all. A successful solution is one that results in no litter being present. Assuming the solution did not involve summarily executing anyone suspected of being about to drop litter, it is unlikely to have significant second-order effects.”

11. (countable, uncommon)A bed, a substrate formed from loose materials.

    “Having first made a litter of shingles, planks or billets, with a layer of charcoal powder several inches in thickness...”

12. (uncountable)The layer of fallen leaves and other loose organic material on the ground in a forest.

    “Litter, that portion of the forest floor which is not in an advanced state of decomposition.”

    “Forest animals use leaf litter in a variety of ways, including as food, shelter, nesting material, bedding, and camouflage.”

13. (uncountable)Fuller's earth, clay pellets, wood chips, or other similar loose absorbent materials used for the waste of pet animals.

    “Change the cat litter fer chrissakes. This place reeks.”

verb

1. (intransitive)To drop or throw trash without properly disposing of it (as discarding in public areas rather than trash receptacles).

   “By tossing the bottle out the window, he was littering.”

2. (transitive)To scatter carelessly about.
3. (transitive)To strew (a place) with scattered articles.

   “Their Clamour, 'lighting from their Chairs, / Grew lowder, all the way up Stairs; / At Entrance louder, where they found, / The Room with Volumes litter'd round; […]”

   “A single written sheet of paper was on the table near her—but there were more than a hundred others, torn across, littering the floor.”

4. (transitive)To give birth to, in the manner of animals.

   “We might conceive that dogs were created blind, because we observe they were littered so with us.”

   “The son that she did litter here, / A freckled whelp hagborn.”

5. (intransitive)To produce a litter of young.

   “A desert […] where the she-wolf still littered.”

6. (transitive)To supply (cattle etc.) with litter; to cover with litter, as the floor of a stall.

   “Tell them how they litter their jades.”

   “For his ease, well litter'd was the floor.”

7. (intransitive)To be supplied with litter as bedding; to sleep or make one's bed in litter.

   “The inn where he and his horse litter'd.”

adj

1. (comparative, form-of)comparative form of lit: more lit