How to Use pluck in a Sentence

pluck

1 of 2 verb
  • The hunter plucked the bird's feathers.
  • He plucked a stone out of the river.
  • Firefighters plucked the child from the top floor of the burning building.
  • My sister plucked a white hair from my head.
  • He'd been plucked from obscurity and thrust into the national spotlight.
  • Go ahead and pluck away without the stress.
    — Alanna Martine Kilkeary, Glamour, 10 June 2026
  • Newton leapt back and plucked it out of the air.
    — Parker Gabriel, Denver Post, 14 Aug. 2025
  • Start planning meals around what just got plucked from a vine.
    — Eric Barton, Sun Sentinel, 4 Jan. 2026
  • When plucked, their broken stems well up with milky droplets.
    — Jacey Fortin Mike Belleme, New York Times, 21 Oct. 2023
  • Woodcock are best plucked and cooked with the skin on to hold in the fat.
    — Matthew Every, Field & Stream, 18 Oct. 2023
  • The ranch looks like it was plucked right out of the set of an old western.
    — Essence, 20 Oct. 2025
  • This time, Franklin didn’t quite reach back and pluck it out of the air.
    — Mike Finger, San Antonio Express-News, 16 Dec. 2022
  • Let’s just go pluck another one out of the tree.
    — Pete Grathoff, Kansas City Star, 22 May 2026
  • On one stoop, a man gently plucked a guitar.
    — Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times, 20 Apr. 2026
  • Carrera now plucks the melody in single notes.
    — Peter Wayne Moe, Longreads, 26 Mar. 2026
  • You get plucked out of your little bubble and whisked across the world.
    — Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, 8 Mar. 2024
  • The characters feel like they’ve been plucked from a book of archetypes.
    — Frank Scheck, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 Nov. 2023
  • Snip off the flowers, then take them indoors to pluck the petals and seeds.
    — Brandee Gruener, Southern Living, 31 Aug. 2025
  • No plucking figures from the sky.
    — Jordan Campbell, New York Times, 5 June 2026
  • But when they’re plucked from the garden and washed, some of the wax washes away.
    — Stacey Lastoe, Southern Living, 29 June 2026
  • That old clip had begun with Doty plucking a pole from a trash bin.
    — Lauren Smiley, WIRED, 7 Nov. 2023
  • Rescuers plucked dozens of people from the water or the shore.
    — Holly Yan, CNN, 11 Aug. 2023
  • Once the hair finally breaks free, resist the urge to pluck or shave it.
    — Maddy Zollo Rusbosin, Women's Health, 28 Feb. 2023
  • You got plucked from obscurity to do this project.
    — Chris Lee, Vulture, 24 Sep. 2025
  • Whether they’re plucked from a chicken or saved from a wild turkey, giblets can be used in all sorts of ways.
    — Matthew Every, Field & Stream, 22 Nov. 2023
  • Was this one of the hens that had pecked my hand or plucked feathers from the pink rump of another?
    — Hazlitt, 14 Feb. 2024
  • Ronan Day-Lewis seems to have plucked and pruned the best lessons from them, too.
    — Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire, 28 Sep. 2025
  • There may be even greater reasons to put an ad that plucks the heartstrings in front of a broader crowd.
    — Brian Steinberg, Variety, 5 Sep. 2025
  • Raped with a statue of Jesus plucked from a mantle.
    — Mike Hixenbaugh, NBC news, 30 Oct. 2025
  • It was accomplished by plucking guitar strings that were fed through the car.
    — Brendan Morrow, The Week, 9 June 2023

pluck

2 of 2 noun
  • It takes pluck to do what she did.
  • She showed pluck in getting up on stage.
  • Lue’s players tell it, that pluck stemmed as much from him as despair.
    — New York Times, 25 June 2021
  • His mother, instead, plucks and offers a large grape from the vine.
    — Erica Hellerstein, The Mercury News, 24 Aug. 2019
  • But with enough pluck and gumption, plus money and genius, it can be done.
    — Joel Achenbach, Washington Post, 19 June 2019
  • Egrets and herons pluck meals from the shoreline and fly by on their way to nesting islands.
    — Ben Abramson, USA TODAY, 25 Oct. 2017
  • With every pluck, the strings seem to vibrate in the air in front of you, blurring like bees’ wings.
    — Philip Sherburne, Pitchfork, 4 June 2026
  • Pluck apart owl pellets to discover what the prey tells us about the predators.
    — Kathy Bennett, The Mercury News, 22 Mar. 2017
  • The real story is one of pork pies, warm beer and gritty working-class pluck.
    — Gerard Degroot, Washington Post, 28 Feb. 2020
  • The Warriors briefly showed some pluck in the first half against the Thunder.
    — Ron Kroichick, San Francisco Chronicle, 2 Jan. 2026
  • Landy Hite was not in terrific voice opening night -- but talk about pluck.
    — Lee Williams, OregonLive.com, 23 Apr. 2018
  • My muscles, which had tensed the second before the pluck, relaxed.
    — ELLE, 28 Apr. 2022
  • About the Baltic states, there are many things to be admired, including their pluck.
    — Jay Nordlinger, National Review, 17 Sep. 2021
  • Pan, impressed by Fosse’s dancing skill no less than his pluck, told him to go ahead.
    — John Check, WSJ, 16 Mar. 2018
  • Hand-pluck coarse texture out of the brow to see more skin throughout and to get the brow to appear more feathered.
    — Jennet Jusu, Allure, 16 Feb. 2022
  • The tweezer feels strong and durable when holding it, and it can be used lightly and still get quite a few hairs with each pluck.
    — Madison Yauger, Peoplemag, 28 Aug. 2022
  • Child services pluck Loquareeous out of his house and place him in foster care.
    — Darren Franich, EW.com, 23 Mar. 2022
  • The idea of cutting off all that life, all that growth and pluck, just for a better view of clapboard, sickened us.
    — Peg Rosen, The Christian Science Monitor, 17 May 2021
  • Clean up your arches with a few plucks of a tweezer or by threading your eyebrows to nab any errant hairs.
    — Lisa Desantis, Glamour, 12 July 2023
  • Beyond making sure the case itself is the proper size for your bow, look for a case with ample pluck foam.
    — The Editors, Outdoor Life, 1 Dec. 2020
  • Even in pitch-blackness, bats can skirt around branches and pluck minuscule insects from the sky.
    — Ed Yong, The Atlantic, 13 June 2022
  • Trump is fond of Paxton’s pluck and Hunt’s ambition.
    — Philip Elliott, Time, 26 Jan. 2026
  • Lasers can nudge proteins and beads, sort cells, and pluck molecules like tweezers, for instance.
    — Max G. Levy, Wired, 12 Feb. 2021
  • The cut-to-fit foam of some models like the protector holds guns even more securely than pluck-to-fit foam does.
    — Phil Bourjaily, Field & Stream, 17 Jan. 2023
  • But over eight hour-long episodes, that youthful pluck starts to seem less like a reason to doubt him than a reason to believe in him.
    — Angie Han, The Hollywood Reporter, 31 Aug. 2023
  • All their stories illuminate the strength, pluck and deep sense of obligation to do the right thing.
    — WSJ, 12 Dec. 2017
  • But this year schools are expecting to turn to them as early as next month and pluck students well into late summer.
    — Melissa Korn, WSJ, 10 Mar. 2021
  • Old chapters on neutrophil combat are even being rewritten to account for the cells’ pluck and aplomb.
    — Katherine J. Wu, The Atlantic, 17 June 2021
  • Their helpers, village women in colorful head wraps, used the yard to scrub clothes and pluck chicken feathers.
    — Hedia Anvar, Longreads, 23 June 2018
  • That the Seahawks hung with the 49ers to the absolute end is a tribute to their pluck.
    — Scott Ostler, SFChronicle.com, 29 Dec. 2019

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