How to Use mottle in a Sentence

mottle

verb

• The 11 brought to White Lake on Tuesday are still mottled brown and white.
  — Washington Post, 14 Nov. 2019
• The curved tusk is dark- and light-brown, mottled and about 5.5 feet (1.7 meters) long.
  — Washington Post, 19 June 2018
• The next day, as the bananas were mottling, a brainstorm hit.
  — Susan Gubar, New York Times, 10 Mar. 2020
• Gray paint on the side of the building was still sooty and peeling, the sidewalk mottled and black.
  — Los Angeles Times, 15 Aug. 2019
• The viruses mottle, yellow, or curl leaves and stunt plant growth.
  — Jeff Lowenfels, Anchorage Daily News, 30 June 2023
• What was once a teardrop below one eye now looks like a bruise or a birthmark, and scars mottle his hands.
  — Jonathan Blitzer, The New Yorker, 23 Jan. 2017
• The Sundems' garage door is mottled with ball marks, the graffiti of a thousand games of Garage.
  — Steve Rushin, SI.com, 21 June 2017
• The Earth is a tiny mottled ball at upper left and the moon is little more than a grey speck in the lower right corner.
  — Matthew Nighswander, NBC News, 29 Sep. 2017
• The animal, with bared teeth and mottled fur, appeared ready to lunge.
  — Neil MacFarquhar, New York Times, 4 Aug. 2019
• Kelvin steers the truck over a dry lagoon mottled with hippo prints to get closer.
  — Ken Geiger, National Geographic, 17 June 2019
• When seen from above, the melting sea ice looked like a field of white mottled with dark splotches where the ice had turned to liquid.
  — Meredith Fore, WIRED, 5 July 2019
• The damage causes plant foliage to look bronzed, flecked or mottled.
  — Betty Cahill, The Denver Post, 24 June 2019
• Daisy hates bananas, even when they aren’t mottled with gray-green splotches.
  — David Canfield, EW.com, 5 June 2019
• Down the slope ahead of him, 500 black Drakensberger and mottled Nguni cows graze cheek by jowl.
  — David McKenzie, CNN, 6 Mar. 2020
• When the bottom tortilla is nicely mottled with golden-brown spots, flip the whole thing and cook until the cheese is melted.
  — Daniel Neman, Twin Cities, 6 June 2019
• In his mugshot, the one-time police officer has wispy white hair and skin mottled with age — a far cry from the fair-haired young man in FBI sketches from decades ago.
  — James Queally, latimes.com, 29 Apr. 2018
• Like every other dog around here, Dounia was small, thin, sharp-snouted, and mottled brown and white.
  — New York Times, 18 June 2018
• Those pastel pinks that mold and mottle, from forced happiness to sweet melancholy.
  — David Campany, The New Yorker, 18 Aug. 2019
• Some of species' pitchers have mottled coloring that looks a bit like tasty carrion, which lures prey inside the pitcher.
  — Liz Langley, National Geographic, 30 Oct. 2019
• The spicebush swallowtail, for example, which is found throughout the eastern U.S., emerges from its egg mottled in black and white.
  — Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker, 13 Mar. 2023
• The light from these sources danced unpredictably and was always mottled by the smoke of imperfect combustion.
  — Christopher Preston, Smithsonian, 26 Nov. 2019
• Ever been on a run through the woods and notice litter mottling the otherwise natural scenery?
  — Nicole Spector /, NBC News, 16 June 2018
• Their roots decayed, their growth was stunted, their leaves turned blotchy and mottled, and their fruit was misshapen, bitter and inedible.
  — Sena Christian, Newsweek, 19 Nov. 2015
• Shots include the makeup artists air-brushing her toes a nice mottled gray, as well as adding a prosthetic layer to her hands to give them a not-so-fresh out-of-the-grave pallor.
  — Molly Horan, Teen Vogue, 15 Sep. 2017
• Steckly had a long and mottled driving history, dating back to age 19.
  — oregonlive, 15 May 2020
• His black cap and chest mottled with brown flecks distinguish him from a dozen other warblers with yellow bodies.
  — Ben Raines, AL.com, 20 Apr. 2018
• Then there was the salt: sprinkled generously enough to mottle the fry’s golden skin and amplify the earthy flavors trapped inside.
  — Washington Post, 29 Nov. 2021
• Others had arms and legs that were mottled purple, splotched with unexplained bruises.
  — Julie Bosman, New York Times, 6 Apr. 2018
• Sam wriggles into her knickers, trying to hide her pale, mottled flesh under the towel.
  — Jojo Moyes, Marie Claire, 12 Oct. 2016
• When paired with the label’s mottled-green denim, the gestural swoops read like off-duty camouflage.
  — Laura Regensdorf, Vogue, 9 Sep. 2017

Last Updated: 5 Sep 2024