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What’s the Plural of Swine?

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Swine, female pigs can have as many as 20 piglets in a litter. Encyclopedia Brittanica.
Female pigs can have as many as 20 piglets in a litter. Encyclopedia Brittanica.

What’s the plural of “swine”?

Swine is used for both singular and plural noun forms of swine.

👍🏼Usage Note

The company helped develop the swine flu vaccine.

Several swine were sick and had to be separated from the rest.

The farmer raised several swines on his property.

There are swines in the pen.

What’s the singular of swine?

Swine works for singular and plural cases.

What are swine?

Dictionary.com on swine:

Any stout, cloven-hoofed artiodactyl of the Old World family Suidae, having a thick hide sparsely covered with coarse hair, a disk-like snout, and an often short, tasseled tail: now of worldwide distribution and hunted or raised for its meat and other products. Compare hog, pig1, wild boar.

💡Study Tip

Practice using singular-only nouns in different sentences to remember the correct forms.

Nouns that stay the same in singular and plural

By Gflex on Canva.

Examples of the word swine used in sentences

1. Pigs can catch both bird and human influenza, in addition to swine flu.

2. Because the swine flu was not nearly as lethal as the novel coronavirus, there was not nearly as much need to halt its spread.

3. Based in Australia, the company is proud of a history that spans from its early use of plasma to beat diphtheria a century ago to helping develop the swine flu vaccine a decade ago.

4. During that period, Sinovac gained approvals to sell influenza, avian flu and swine flu vaccines in China.

5. In 2009, the WHO was accused of acting too early in declaring swine flu a pandemic, in part over concerns it had been pressured by pharmaceutical companies.

Origin of the word swine

From etymology online on swine (n.):

Old English swin “pig, hog, wild boar,” from Proto-Germanic *sweina- (source also of Old Saxon, Old Frisian Middle Low German, Old High German swin, Middle Dutch swijn, Dutch zwijn, German Schwein, Old Norse, Swedish, Danish svin)

Worksheet

Question 1 of 10

What is the plural form of “swine” according to the blog post?



What is the singular form of “swine”?



Which sentence uses the correct past participle of “know”?



Based on the blog post, what is another word for swine?



According to the blog post, what is the origin of the word “swine”?



The plural of swine is .



The singular of swine is .



The correct past participle of “know” is .



One synonym for swine mentioned in the text is .



The blog post suggests practicing verb tenses to improve .





Frequently Asked Questions

What’s the plural of “swine”?
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The word “swine” is unusual because it serves as both the singular and plural form. There is no separate plural form like “swines.” The post uses “swine” in various sentences (e.g., “swine flu.

Is “swines” grammatically correct?
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No, the post explicitly states that “swine” functions as both singular and plural. Using “swines” would be grammatically incorrect according to the provided text, which focuses on the word’s.

What’s the singular of “swine”?
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“Swine” itself is the singular form. The blog post highlights that this word doesn’t change form to indicate plurality; “swine” can refer to one pig or many.

How is “swine” used in a sentence?
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The post provides examples such as “swine flu” and “the company…helping develop the swine flu vaccine.” These show how “swine” functions as both a singular and plural noun depending on the.

What’s a common grammar error related to “swine”?
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A common error (though not explicitly stated as such in this post) would be incorrectly attempting to create a plural form like “swines,” when the word remains consistent whether referring to one.

Yash, D. "What’s the Plural of Swine?." Grammarflex, Jun 13, 2025, https://www.grammarflex.com/whats-the-plural-of-swine/.

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