red herring
noun
Did you know?
Believe it or not, red herring has as much to do with hunting dogs as with brightly colored fish. Here's how: A herring is a soft-finned bony fish. People who like to eat herring have long preserved them by salting and slowly smoking them. That process makes a herring turn red or dark brown—and gives them a very strong smell. Dogs love to sniff such smelly treats, a fact that makes the fish a perfect diversion for anyone trying to distract hunting dogs from the trail of their quarry. The practice of using preserved fish to confuse hunting dogs led to the use of the term red herring for anything that diverts attention from the issue at hand.
Examples of red herring in a Sentence
Lynsey Eidell, People.com, 22 Mar. 2025
Maybe reintegration is just a big red herring of sorts.
—Eliana Dockterman, TIME, 21 Mar. 2025
Set in dreary Copenhagen with a cast of characters who all could be suspects, there are red herrings galore.
—Andrea Duncan-Mao, Vulture, 26 Feb. 2025
The red herring of legitimacy But what if the call is legitimate?
—Kurt Knutsson, Cyberguy Report, Fox News, 22 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for red herring
Cite this Entry
“Red herring.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/red%20herring. Accessed 27 Mar. 2025.
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