canaries in a coal mine
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.74 in modern English
25
Scrabble Score
19
Letters
3
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "The weakest members of society become social barometers or canaries in a coal mine."
- "One of the few animals to live part of its life in water and part on land, frogs are seen by some as canaries in a coal mine — which is why the chytrid fungus has environmentalists worried."
- "Perhaps public assistance has little to do with obesity among the poor; instead, the poor may simply be canaries in a coal mine, their health suffering from environmental changes before others feel the impact."