How to Use prickly in a Sentence

prickly

adjective
Definition of pricklynext
Synonyms for pricklynext
  • The plant's leaves are prickly.
  • What can the rest of us learn from the prickly people in the world?
    — Suzy Exposito, Vogue, 26 Mar. 2024
  • Heat tends to make the rash much worse and the skin starts to become prickly.
    — Jacqueline Andriakos, SELF, 14 May 2018
  • The raw meat, the subtle fat, the prickly acidities of the sauce, the pure flavor.
    — Bill Buford, The New Yorker, 17 Dec. 2020
  • There are less prickly pieces of loose fur to stick to your clothes.
    — Lauren Palmer, Curbed, 15 June 2018
  • But who will get the best of the prickly Putin-Macron courtship remains to be seen.
    — Henry Meyer, Bloomberg.com, 5 July 2017
  • The big cat was perched on a tall, prickly cactus, but didn't seem to mind the spikes.
    — Caitlin O'Kane, CBS News, 19 June 2018
  • To start your prep, the first tool to grab is a pair of kitchen shears, which makes snipping the prickly tips of the leaves a breeze.
    — Claire Perez, Sun-Sentinel.com, 10 Mar. 2018
  • Saguaros, the prickly gift suggests, are a guy's best friend.
    — Mary Schmich, chicagotribune.com, 14 Sep. 2017
  • And although Ames forges the story’s premise, prickly, funny Reese is the star of the show.
    — Crispin Long, The New Yorker, 31 Jan. 2021
  • Spruce needles also can be stiff and prickly to the touch.
    — Sheryl Devore, chicagotribune.com, 24 Dec. 2020
  • Look, read the labels, mull over the prickly unanswered questions many of the pieces leave you with.
    — New York Times, 10 Feb. 2022
  • Gin: The gin’s role here is to add some prickly juniper on the finish, so get one that has a lot of that.
    — Jason O'Bryan, Robb Report, 24 June 2023
  • This raises the first of the movie’s many prickly questions: What does Erin owe her ex-boyfriend?
    — Stephanie Merry, kansascity, 21 Sep. 2017
  • My hair stood on end, and prickly sweat savaged my cheeks.
    — Erik Hedegaard, Rolling Stone, 16 Oct. 2021
  • That is, Pages stacked the deck in favour of the quirky, the prickly, the heroically uncommercial.
    — Jason Guriel, Longreads, 10 Nov. 2022
  • Up close, the harpsichord can be a wild, prickly beast.
    — Alex Ross, The New Yorker, 14 May 2018
  • Put on a pair of gloves to protect your hands from prickly tree branches.
    — Rabekah Henderson, Southern Living, 30 Nov. 2024
  • Big yellow orbs still cling to a prickly maze of vines that has mostly died.
    — Tess Taylor, CNN, 30 Oct. 2021
  • Rocks, a sparse clumping of tall grass, prickly things like cacti, and Joshua Trees as far as the eye can see.
    — Allyson Portee, Forbes, 2 Jan. 2023
  • Electric blues, reds and purples of prickly urchins, sea stars and an anemones.
    — Outside Online, 26 June 2024
  • But Joe is a relief — funny, prickly, human — and the film could use more of him.
    — Manohla Dargis, New York Times, 4 Mar. 2020
  • Days later, hair would appear in his armpits again, tiny and prickly, like the heads of toothpicks in a jar.
    — Hurmat Kazmi, The Atlantic, 23 Nov. 2021
  • Stop at the Cholla Cactus Garden and walk along its paths, but don't get too close to the prickly plants.
    — Patricia Doherty, Travel + Leisure, 27 Mar. 2023
  • Somebody has a nest on the ground here, and somebody is pretty prickly about it.
    — Murr Brewster, The Christian Science Monitor, 31 May 2017
  • Now 2 weeks old, zoo staff said the prickly little one is doing well.
    — From Usa Today Network and Wire Reports, USA TODAY, 26 Jan. 2022
  • High will demonstrate how to care for, gather and cook prickly pears.
    — Jeanette Marantos, Los Angeles Times, 7 Oct. 2021
  • Then in 2016, in a show of deference to the prickly Persians, Xi went to Tehran to cement the alliance.
    — Christian Schneider, National Review, 21 Dec. 2023
  • Paul is Roy, the prickly guy whose sarcastic exterior hides a soppy desire to be loved.
    — Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 24 Dec. 2024
  • Cha-il’s prickly attitude doesn’t soften much despite the good example set by the naïve rookie auditor Han-soo (Lee Jung-ha).
    — Simon Abrams, New York Times, 27 Dec. 2024

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