How to Use lemming in a Sentence

lemming

noun
  • And the news media ran with it like lemmings.
    — William Earl, Variety, 19 Feb. 2026
  • The trio lunged over the balcony rail in full lemming mode.
    — Jeff Spry, Space.com, 26 June 2026
  • But hearing a lemming is only the first step in getting a meal.
    — Jacob Job, The Conversation, 22 Feb. 2021
  • The main prey on her newfound home, meanwhile, is a type of rodent known as a lemming.
    — Meilan Solly, Smithsonian, 3 July 2019
  • Now there seems to be something both defiant and lemming-like—and just plain stupid—about them.
    — Cressida Leyshon, The New Yorker, 12 Oct. 2020
  • When lemmings are abundant, snowies are able to successfully hatch and fledge more young.
    — Paul A. Smith, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 16 Dec. 2017
  • When lemmings are in plentiful supply, the owls will produce more eggs.
    — Mari A. Schaefer, Philly.com, 5 Mar. 2018
  • One key species that is being affected by climate change in the tundra is the lemming.
    — Devi Lockwood, Wired, 21 Sep. 2021
  • If those lemmings play along, the precedent will be devastating.
    — Dan Perry, MSNBC Newsweek, 8 Sep. 2025
  • These dramatically kill ants that run across them—the problem is that all fire ants are not like lemmings.
    — The Editors Of Organic Life, Good Housekeeping, 26 June 2017
  • The birds lay eggs in shallow depressions on the ground and feed their young on rodents, mostly lemmings.
    — Paul A. Smith, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 16 Dec. 2017
  • Snowy owls raise their young on the tundra and rely mostly on lemmings, whose populations rise and fall, for food.
    — Sheryl Devore, Lake County News-Sun, 15 Dec. 2017
  • Once again, yer a lemming following the other lemmings over the Windoze cliff.
    — Wired Blogs, WIRED, 11 Jan. 2007
  • More lemmings means the owl population explodes— and that more birds than usual will winter in places people can see them.
    — Washington Post, 22 Dec. 2017
  • More lemmings means the owl population explodes – and that more birds than usual will winter in places people can see them.
    — Tammy Webber, The Christian Science Monitor, 22 Dec. 2017
  • In the Arctic, there’s small nibblers like lemmings, but there are also big nibblers with fangs, like wolves and foxes.
    — Sarah Scoles, Quanta Magazine, 20 Sep. 2023
  • Some years may see higher lemming populations, but that doesn't necessarily help the owls in the long run.
    — Cara Korte, CBS News, 30 Jan. 2021
  • The excuses are lemmings, following one another over the cliff.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 1 July 2023
  • Arctic foxes and wolves stalk lemmings and reindeer; herds of shaggy musk oxen roam the hills; gray whales and belugas shimmer offshore.
    — Ferris Jabr, Smithsonian Magazine, 3 July 2024
  • During the Arctic summer, snowy owls feed primarily on small rodents called lemmings.
    — Don Lyman, BostonGlobe.com, 30 Dec. 2019
  • Now, the conference, like a lemming off the cliff, is following the path of the other Power-5 conferences.
    — Ann Killion, SFChronicle.com, 24 Sep. 2020
  • Patel is a field tech with Team Vole, a group of some 20 researchers studying Alaska’s voles and lemmings.
    — Bathsheba Demuth, The Atlantic, 4 Jan. 2024
  • Foxes in Canada's Ellesmere Island eat mostly lemmings, which are small rodents.
    — Caitlin O'Kane, CBS News, 2 July 2019
  • The animals, which have thick fur to survive cold environments and live to about age 4, eat fish, marine birds and small arctic rodents called lemmings.
    — Washington Post, 3 July 2019
  • Loads of school children in matching hats are trotting around the grounds like lemmings to admire the home where Leonardo da Vinci spent the last three years of his life.
    — Joe Baur, Travel + Leisure, 17 Aug. 2025
  • What matters is adulation received from an emotional display before a packed sea of millionaire lemmings.
    — Fox News, 12 June 2018
  • That’s the latest chapter in this tale of a CEO who followed his woke staff like a lemming off the cliff of cultural politics.
    — The Editorial Board, WSJ, 21 Apr. 2022
  • More lemmings feed more owls, but if a prosperous lemming season is not followed by another with the same productivity, an ecosystem can crash.
    — Cara Korte, CBS News, 30 Jan. 2021
  • Except that the Norwegian lemming, Lemmus lemmus, isn't quite normal.
    — Elizabeth Preston, Discover Magazine, 20 Feb. 2015
  • The robust offensive numbers up there mostly fell off a cliff, one after another, like li’l statistical lemmings.
    — Grant Brisbee, New York Times, 24 Feb. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'lemming.' 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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