How to Use pickings in a Sentence

pickings

plural noun
  • That makes easy pickings for the bears once the fish start running.
    — Scott McMurren, Anchorage Daily News, 25 June 2022
  • Easy pickings, though the rhythms and staging are just right.
    — Bill Goodykoontz, The Arizona Republic, 9 June 2021
  • Passive birds that strut just beyond the hen are still easy pickings for a crossbow.
    — Will Brantley, Field & Stream, 22 Mar. 2021
  • Wasps love your sugary drinks and may hover over your picnic pickings hoping for a taste.
    — Ashley Leath, Country Living, 29 May 2020
  • But travelers who had thoughts of travel abroad this summer will find slim pickings.
    — Barbara Peterson, Condé Nast Traveler, 4 June 2020
  • In nature, a lame duck is a weakling, a bird that can’t keep up with the flock and is easy pickings for predators.
    — Oliver Staley, Quartz, 7 Nov. 2020
  • The Texans should be easy pickings for the Seahawks this week, even on the road.
    — Jeremy Cluff, The Arizona Republic, 7 Dec. 2021
  • Though craft stores have reopened, both knitting veterans and those new to the craft may find slim pickings.
    — Washington Post, 5 Oct. 2020
  • After all, fireflies are slow in the air and would make easy pickings for a silent, super-fast flier such as a bat.
    — Jason Bittel, Washington Post, 25 Aug. 2020
  • The pickings are slim this weekend for your fill of SEC football.
    — Mark Heim | [email protected], al, 14 Nov. 2020
  • Thomas, 38, is looking for a full-time job, preferably working from home, but the pickings are slim.
    — Tami Luhby, CNN, 8 Aug. 2020
  • For her part, Porter was once seen by Republicans as easy pickings.
    — Mark Z. Barabak Staff Writer, Los Angeles Times, 16 Dec. 2020
  • But so far the pickings from Britain’s departure from the EU have been slim.
    — Ned Temko, The Christian Science Monitor, 3 Feb. 2022
  • But the pickings are slim even outside of yesterday’s narrow slate of speakers.
    — Isaac Schorr, National Review, 18 Aug. 2020
  • Every show is different and exciting, and the jokes are easy pickings.
    — Mitra Ahouraian, Forbes, 13 June 2022
  • The stocky 36-year-old sized up the slim pickings and zeroed in on a pale European couple.
    — Anthony Faiola, Washington Post, 29 May 2021
  • The slow, heavily laden aircraft were easy pickings for fast-moving German planes.
    — David Kindy, Smithsonian Magazine, 2 Aug. 2021
  • That describes the market for AWD überhatchs, too—these days, the pickings are slim.
    — Jonathan M. Gitlin, Ars Technica, 28 Feb. 2022
  • The pickings are slim, especially if the league wishes to remain in its current footprint.
    — Paul Myerberg, USA TODAY, 28 July 2021
  • The pickings are slim, especially if the league wishes to remain in its current footprint.
    — Jeremy Cluff, The Arizona Republic, 12 Aug. 2021
  • There were slim pickings for the birds in the landscapes because of the heat and dry weather of summer and fall of 2020.
    — Calvin Finch, San Antonio Express-News, 16 Apr. 2021
  • Young lobsters are easy pickings for the virus because the animals are so social, at times denning in groups of up to 20.
    — Scientific American, 1 July 2020
  • When the temperature was in the lower 50s, cicadas made easy pickings.
    — Washington Post, 1 Feb. 2022
  • For those looking for something a bit closer to the action -- nearer Rome, to be precise -- it's been slim pickings.
    — Silvia Marchetti, CNN, 21 Aug. 2021
  • So far, the pickings have been slim for Vitamix deals, even among Amazon competitors.
    — Camryn Rabideau, Forbes, 23 June 2021
  • So far, the pickings have been slim for Vitamix deals, even among Amazon competitors.
    — Camryn Rabideau, Forbes, 21 June 2021
  • Whether this is a preference for the rich pickings of the harbor, a fear of what lies beyond, or something else is impossible to say.
    — Cathleen O'Grady, Smithsonian Magazine, 22 July 2020
  • The Sims offers up many options for customisation, but like so many other video games, the pickings were slim for people who weren’t white and thin.
    — Ineye Komonibo, refinery29.com, 23 June 2022
  • While the pickings might be thin on the free-agency list, there is a whole other world out there on the trade market, a market that does not have the same timing elements as free agency.
    — Ira Winderman, Sun Sentinel, 2 July 2022
  • In the first March of the pandemic, a friend in Pennsylvania e-mailed me about the slim pickings on TV.
    — The New Yorker, 14 Oct. 2021

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