A bird with a tail that spreads out in a fan shape, or a type of pigeon bred to have a large fanned tail; also used in nautical contexts for the stern section of a ship.
Compound of 'fan' + 'tail,' from Old English 'fann' (fan) + 'tægel' (tail). The term describes the distinctive fan-shaped tail characteristic of certain bird species.
Fantails were one of the earliest domesticated pigeon breeds, and pigeon fanciers spent centuries selectively breeding them to have absurdly large tails—some have over 30 tail feathers instead of normal birds' 14, showing the extremes of human artificial selection.
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