troughnoun/tɹɒf/

• 1

  A long, narrow container, open on top, for feeding or watering animals.

  • One of Harriet's chores was to slop the pigs' trough each morning and evening.
• 2

  Any similarly shaped container.

  • Now, covered concrete troughs to house the cables are laid parallel with the railway lines, cheapening maintenance because of improved accessibility for inspection and repair.
  • It just clips on the front of the stage without any special trough, has no great power and occupies only one dimmer, […]
• 3

  Any similarly shaped container.

  • Ernest threw his paint brushes into a kind of trough he had fashioned from sheet metal that he kept in the sink.
• 4

  A short, narrow canal designed to hold water until it drains or evaporates.

  • There was a small trough that the sump pump emptied into; it was filled with mosquito larvae.
• 5

  An undivided metal urinal (plumbing fixture)

• 6

  A gutter under the eaves of a building; an eaves trough.

  • The troughs were filled with leaves and needed clearing.
• 7

  agriculturebusinesslifestyleA channel for conveying water or other farm liquids (such as milk) from place to place by gravity; any ‘U’ or ‘V’ cross-sectioned irrigation channel.

• 8

  A long, narrow depression between waves or ridges; the low portion of a wave cycle.

  • The buoy bobbed between the crests and troughs of the waves moving across the bay.
  • The neurologist pointed to a troubling trough in the pattern of his brain-waves.

troughverb/tɹɒf/

• 1

  To eat in a vulgar style, as if from a trough.

  • He troughed his way through three meat pies.