How to Use prey in a Sentence

prey

1 of 2 noun
  • The seals are easy prey for sharks.
  • The lion stalked its prey.
  • The bird circled above looking for prey.
  • Too often elderly people are easy prey for swindlers and other criminals.
  • The same can’t be said about their prey.
    — Boston Herald Editorial Staff, Boston Herald, 23 Mar. 2026
  • The Bills often fall prey to the run.
    — Pete Grathoff, Kansas City Star, 2 Nov. 2025
  • Yet two more pitfalls my poor little shrub fell prey to.
    — Patricia Shannon, Southern Living, 29 Apr. 2026
  • Bigger fish slammed prey in a shallow pool next to the bank.
    — Bryan Hendricks, Arkansas Online, 15 Feb. 2026
  • Both are primary prey for white sharks.
    — Ethan Baron, Mercury News, 24 Dec. 2025
  • Groups of whales swim in a circle around their prey … and blow bubbles.
    — Laura Helmuth, Scientific American, 1 Apr. 2023
  • Main prey for larvae is katydids.
    — Pamm Cooper, Hartford Courant, 9 May 2026
  • Small dogs should always be kept on leash, as they can be perceived as prey.
    — Lisa Bloch, Mercury News, 20 Jan. 2026
  • Orion’s favorite prey was wild hare.
    — Mike Lynch, Twin Cities, 11 Jan. 2026
  • Don’t fall prey to wishful thinking.
    — Alla Adam, Forbes.com, 26 May 2026
  • Bald eagles have very strong eyesight, and are able to spot prey from a mile away.
    — Madeline Gunderson, USA Today, 19 June 2026
  • So when and why did humans fall prey to such a pernicious threat?
    — Andrew Paul, Popular Science, 26 Feb. 2026
  • The latest celebs to fall prey to the romance rumor mill?
    — Sara Moniuszko, USA Today, 25 June 2026
  • Wet weather gives an archer one great advantage over the prey.
    — Fred Bear, Outdoor Life, 11 June 2026
  • The machine can hide in the foliage for days, awaiting its prey.
    — Nick Paton Walsh, CNN Money, 30 May 2026
  • These can be insecure and present easy prey for hackers.
    — Mark Sparrow, Forbes.com, 31 May 2026
  • The bird glided through the air, skimming the water for prey.
    — Liz O'Connell, MSNBC Newsweek, 9 Sep. 2025
  • The group said the parents would feed the eaglets small pieces of fish or other prey.
    — Hanna Wickes, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 7 Apr. 2026
  • Who needs a movie that is almost all predators, with barely a word from their prey?
    — Anthony Lane, The New Yorker, 15 Sep. 2023
  • Where lions kill quickly, wild dogs devour their prey alive, one bite at a time.
    — AFAR Media, 30 Oct. 2025
  • Sit naked and wait to become mosquito prey?
    — David Hu, The Conversation, 18 Mar. 2026
  • Great whites, not used to being prey, fled further up the coast, Kock said.
    — Michael H Gavshon, CBS News, 12 Apr. 2026
  • This light, which the fireflies use to attract mates, acts as a lure for other prey.
    — Mrigakshi Dixit, Interesting Engineering, 29 Aug. 2025
  • The former prey required twice the force for crabs to crack open with their claws than the latter.
    — WIRED, 8 Nov. 2023
  • The size of a wolf’s prey, research shows, seems to correlate to its own body size.
    — Natalie Krebs, Outdoor Life, 11 June 2026
  • Primates, on the other hand, are riskier prey.
    — Scott Travers, Forbes.com, 17 May 2026

prey

2 of 2 verb
  • Oh, and monsters come out at night to prey on them.
    — Erik Kain, Forbes.com, 22 May 2026
  • They’ve been known to scale or dig beneath fences to prey on pets.
    — Alex Wigglesworth, Los Angeles Times, 11 Mar. 2024
  • Hawks and owls prey on rodents bounding across grassy slopes.
    — Louis Sahagún, Los Angeles Times, 27 Feb. 2024
  • And cats tend to prey on weak birds that probably would have died anyway.
    — Avery Hurt, Discover Magazine, 5 July 2022
  • This is a career low point for both actors, preying on their weak spots.
    — Tim Grierson, Vulture, 18 Oct. 2025
  • That’s because there are so many animals that prey on smolts.
    — oregonlive, 27 Aug. 2023
  • Kurt's key takeaways These scams prey on emotion.
    — Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 23 Oct. 2025
  • This is due to that area's seal population, which the sharks prey on.
    — Ronn Blitzer, Fox News, 30 June 2022
  • These support both seed-eating birds as well as the insects that birds prey on.
    — Maria Azzurra Volpe, MSNBC Newsweek, 1 Oct. 2025
  • Remove trash and food scraps, which can attract predators that may prey on eggs and chicks.
    — Stephen Underwood, Hartford Courant, 26 May 2026
  • There is no reason this person should ever be set free again to prey on others.
    — Greg Wehner, Fox News, 12 Mar. 2024
  • High transaction fees add to worries that they can be used to prey on poor people.
    — Amrith Ramkumar, WSJ, 25 Aug. 2022
  • Chaplin was not a libertine in the sense of a man who sleeps around or who preys on women.
    — Louis Menand, The New Yorker, 13 Nov. 2023
  • These arthropods are more likely to prey on ticks when they are fully engorged with blood.
    — Paul Richards, Field & Stream, 9 Nov. 2023
  • Serial killers were preying on teenagers in their summer camps, in their dreams.
    — Louis Bayard, Washington Post, 19 Aug. 2023
  • Wolves fans knew how to prey on Arsenal’s fragility.
    — Caoimhe O'Neill, New York Times, 19 Feb. 2026
  • Wasps keep garden pests under control by preying on them.
    — Brandee Gruener, Southern Living, 7 May 2026
  • She gets turned into a vampire and starts leaving her coffin to prey on children.
    — Literary Hub, 5 May 2026
  • The rat snakes are common in Texas and usually prey on chicken eggs.
    — Brenton Blanchet, Peoplemag, 14 Apr. 2023
  • Not so long ago, most ranchers kept a pack of dogs to deal with the mountain lions that preyed on their livestock.
    — Bill Heavey, Field & Stream, 1 Feb. 2024
  • Each of those initial five episodes is preying on a different kind of fear people might have.
    — Abbey White, The Hollywood Reporter, 13 Oct. 2023
  • The large salamander mainly preys on crayfish, so the team made sure there were plenty in the area.
    — The Indianapolis Star, 17 Aug. 2023
  • These criminals prey on trust, confusion and fear.
    — Summer Stephan, San Diego Union-Tribune, 9 Oct. 2025
  • But the eagles brought sticks, fluff and prey to the nest, and mated — all signs Jackie might lay new eggs.
    — Lila Seidman, Los Angeles Times, 4 Apr. 2026
  • What's worse, these debt relief scams often prey on people already struggling to make ends meet.
    — Joshua Sidorowicz, CBS News, 8 May 2026
  • These areas attract rodents, birds, and snakes that the coyote will prey upon.
    — Andy Humbles, Nashville Tennessean, 3 Dec. 2025
  • After losing their clutch, the eagles brought sticks, fluff and prey to the nest, and mated — all signs new eggs might come.
    — Lila Seidman, Los Angeles Times, 3 Mar. 2026
  • The true enemy is weight-loss schemes, which are designed to prey on women and, by proxy, their daughters.
    — Danielle Sinay, Glamour, 7 Oct. 2022
  • The series taught millions of parents the tactics some men used to prey on minors online.
    — Jason Newman, Rolling Stone, 20 Sep. 2025
  • Davis said serial killers tend to prey on people on the margins of society.
    — Aria Jones, Dallas News, 21 July 2023

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

Last Updated: