How to Use civet in a Sentence

civet

noun
  • Each civet has its own wooden cage, which is cleaned every three days.
    — Mallory Locklear, Discover Magazine, 12 Oct. 2014
  • Pure civet is a crude, buttery-yellow paste that turns darker with age.
    — Mallory Locklear, Discover Magazine, 12 Oct. 2014
  • The trail is a palimpsest of their giant, pancake-round tracks and the lobed pads of hyenas or toes of civets.
    — Alex Postman, Condé Nast Traveler, 1 Apr. 2024
  • The virus originated in bats and is thought to have passed through palm civets on its way to people.
    — Robert Langreth, Bloomberg.com, 8 May 2020
  • Most of us didn’t ride camels, didn’t eat monkeys, didn’t handle live bats or civet cats in the marketplace.
    — National Geographic, 16 June 2020
  • In life, the carnivore was about the size of a bobcat and probably behaved like a civet or fossa.
    — Riley Black, Smithsonian Magazine, 29 June 2023
  • Its natural diet is mainly rodents, but larger snakes have been known to feed on pigs, civets, bearcats and even primates.
    — Chris Pandolfo, Fox News, 8 June 2024
  • In the meantime the quest for a thoroughly humane way of harvesting civet continues.
    — Mallory Locklear, Discover Magazine, 12 Oct. 2014
  • Bats are the likely original hosts; thousands of captive civet cats suspected of carrying the virus were killed.
    — Alberto Lucas LÓpez, National Geographic, 17 June 2021
  • Most of these viruses were transferred from bats to an intermediate host, like a palm civet or camel, before making their way to humans.
    — New York Times, 17 Jan. 2021
  • But when these viruses leap into a new species—whether a pangolin or a civet or a human—the result can be severe, sometimes deadly, sickness.
    — Carolyn Kormann, The New Yorker, 27 Mar. 2020
  • By 2007, researchers were raising alarms once more about the sale and consumption of animals like civets.
    — Melody Schreiber, The New Republic, 29 Jan. 2020
  • With the spread of the coronavirus, China’s government has banned the trade and consumption of wildlife such as civet cats and bamboo rats.
    — Anna Fifield, Washington Post, 24 Aug. 2020
  • But the civets proved to be intermediate hosts, and its natural host was later identified as horseshoe bats.
    — David Quammen, New York Times, 25 July 2023
  • Her menagerie over the years included a warthog named Grunter and a civet fond of being sprinkled with Old Spice shaving lotion.
    — James R. Hagerty, WSJ, 20 Apr. 2018
  • Overall, Poust notes, Diegoaelurus was probably closer in appearance to a civet or a fossa.
    — Riley Black, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Mar. 2022
  • China, a country that once considered beef as exotic an ingredient as palm civet and water deer, has been the driver of that growth in recent decades.
    — David Fickling | Bloomberg, Washington Post, 24 Nov. 2019
  • Some sell more unusual fare, including live snakes, turtles and cicadas, guinea pigs, bamboo rats, badgers, hedgehogs, otters, palm civets, even wolf cubs.
    — Steven Lee Myers, BostonGlobe.com, 25 Jan. 2020
  • That animal probably transmitted the virus to an intermediate host, like a mink, pangolin, civet or racoon dog, which then passed the virus to a human.
    — Theresa MacHemer, Smithsonian Magazine, 6 Apr. 2021
  • The animals belong to the family Viverridae, which includes civets and fossas.
    — Rachel Raposas, PEOPLE, 15 Dec. 2025
  • Machine learning identified the palm civet and greater horseshoe bat as the species likeliest to transmit novel coronaviruses to humans.
    — Rafil Kroll-Zaidi, Harper's Magazine, 27 Apr. 2021
  • The brew’s distinction has to do with how the beans are sourced—from the feces of the civet, a coffee-loving catlike animal found in the wild, whose digestion process is said to improve the taste.
    — Charles Passy, WSJ, 16 Oct. 2017
  • Its staff recently welcomed a newborn black wildebeest, crowned lemur and an Owston’s civet kitten, which was hand-reared by keepers — a first-time feat, according to the zoo.
    — Benjamin Vanhoose, PEOPLE.com, 7 Nov. 2019
  • Inside the civet's digestive tract, the beans are fermented and broken down, then the coffee is harvested from the civet's feces, washed thoroughly and roasted.
    — Josie Goodrich, USA TODAY, 7 July 2023
  • The olfactory journey spans five continents with scents both recognizable and obscure, like the musk secreted by the glands of the nocturnal civet.
    — Shoshi Parks, Smithsonian Magazine, 5 July 2024
  • To many, the region’s burgeoning wildlife markets—which sell a wide range of animals such as bats, civets, pangolins, badgers and crocodiles—are perfect viral melting pots.
    — Jane Qiu, Scientific American, 11 Mar. 2020
  • Besides the leopard, keep your eyes peeled for hyenas, jackals, wild cats, foxes, civets, nilgai, sambar, and birds including peacocks, parakeets, and woodpeckers.
    — Condé Nast Traveller, Condé Nast Traveler, 29 Nov. 2022
  • The surveys collect samples of blood, urine, and feces from animals such as bats, pangolins, civet cats, or any other mammal found in markets, animal trade and supply chains, on farms, and in wild habitats.
    — Larry Mullin, National Geographic, 6 Nov. 2020
  • The civet, a small catlike mammal found throughout Southeast Asia and parts of Africa, marks its territory by secreting a distinctive scent from its anal glands.
    — Antonia Noori Farzan, BostonGlobe.com, 1 Feb. 2020
  • Malagasy fossa are most closely related to mongoose and civets, with short and thick fur ranging in color from brown to almost golden with a lighter belly, according to the San Diego Zoo.
    — Irene Wright, Miami Herald, 14 Oct. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'civet.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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