Short-tailed bird Radical (隹) — Characters, Meaning and Practice Worksheet
隹 is the short-tailed bird radical. It appears in 16 of the most common Chinese characters — these 12 are the ones worth learning first, and the worksheet below gives every one of them a pinyin header, a stroke-by-stroke model and blank Tianzige grids to copy into.
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What does 隹 mean?
Short-tailed bird radical · 隹 zhuī · 8 strokes · a short-tailed bird
It usually appears on the left, or on the right. The Origin column below shows what each character's parts do — many take their meaning from the radical, some take their sound from the other half.
Shapes: 隹
隹 itself: A bird facing left; compare 鳥
12 common characters with 隹
Ranked by how often they appear in real written Chinese. Every character links to its own page with a stroke-order animation and example words.
| Character | Pinyin | Meaning | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|
| 难 | nán | difficult | A hand 又 trying to grasp at a bird 隹 |
| 准 | zhǔn | allow, permit | 隹 supplies the sound |
| 集 | jí | gather, collect; centre on | Birds 隹 flocking on a tree 木 |
| 谁 | shuí | who | 隹 supplies the sound |
| 推 | tuī | push | 隹 supplies the sound |
| 维 | wéi | to preserve; to maintain; to hold together; dimension; vitamin (abbr.… | 隹 supplies the sound |
| 雄 | xióng | male; heroic | 厷 supplies the sound |
| 售 | shòu | (bound form) to sell; to retail; (literary) to carry out (a plan or in… | A street vendor talks 口 incessantly, like a bird 隹 |
| 唯 | wéi | only; alone; -ism (in Chinese, a prefix, often combined with a suffix… | |
| 雅 | yǎ | elegant, refined | 牙 supplies the sound |
| 焦 | jiāo | burnt; scorched; charred; worried; anxious; coke; joule (abbr. for 焦耳) | A bird 隹 getting its tail singed 灬 |
| 堆 | duī | pile, heap | 隹 supplies the sound |
Related Radicals
- 钅Metal radical · jīn26 common characters · gold, metal
- 门Gate radical · mén12 common characters · gate, door
- 阝Mound radical · fù36 common characters · a mound (on the left) or a city (on the right)
- 雨Rain radical · yǔ8 common characters · rain
- 青Blue-green radical · qīng8 common characters · blue; green
- 页Head radical · yè18 common characters · head — originally a person's head
Create Your Own Chinese Worksheet
The download above is fixed; the generator is not. Turn any character list, sentence or textbook section into a printable worksheet — grid style, paper size and header are yours to pick.