hatch

noun

1. A horizontal door in a floor or ceiling.

   “Moving the wardrobe revealed a previously hidden hatch in the ground.”

2. A trapdoor.
3. An opening in a wall at window height for the purpose of serving food or other items. A pass through.

   “The cook passed the dishes through the serving hatch.”

   “A service hatch with sliding shutter is situated at the end of the kitchen next to the dining compartment.”

4. A small door in large mechanical structures and vehicles such as aircraft and spacecraft often provided for access for maintenance.

   “A surprising number of incidents is due to roof hatches being left loose or in the raised position when locomotives return to service after maintenance. On one occasion, a 25kV overhead line was damaged by an open hatch.”

5. An opening through the deck of a ship or submarine
6. (slang)A gullet.
7. A frame or weir in a river, for catching fish.
8. A floodgate; a sluice gate.

   “The farmers lower down the brook pull up the hatches to let the flood pass.”

9. (Scotland)A bedstead.

   “It consisted of a rude wooden stool , and still ruder hatch or bed-frame”

10. An opening into, or in search of, a mine.
11. The act of hatching.
12. (figuratively)Development; disclosure; discovery.

    “There's ſomething in his ſoule? / O'er which his Melancholly ſits on brood, / And I do doubt the hatch, and the diſcloſe / Will be ſome danger, which to preuent / I haue in quicke determination”

13. A group of birds that emerged from eggs at a specified time.

    “These pullets are from an April hatch.”

14. (often)The phenomenon, lasting 1–2 days, of large clouds of mayflies appearing in one location to mate, having reached maturity.

    “a. 1947, Edward R. Hewitt, quoted in 1947, Charles K. Fox, Redistribution of the Green Drake, 1997, Norm Shires, Jim Gilford (editors), Limestone Legends, page 104, The Willowemoc above Livington Manor had the largest mayfly hatch I ever knew about fifty years ago.”

    “The major application of the parachute is for mayfly hatches, but it's also useful for midge hatches.”

    “Many years the mayfly hatch begins by the time the lake opens in April. Otherwise, expect strong hatches by mid-May. The hatches continue through midsummer.”

15. (informal)A birth, the birth records (in the newspaper).

    “hatch, match, and dispatch”

verb

1. (transitive)To close with a hatch or hatches.

   “'Twere not amiss to keep our door hatched.”

2. (intransitive)To emerge from an egg.

   “These three chicks hatched yesterday morning.”

3. (intransitive)To break open when a young animal emerges from it.

   “She was delighted when she heard the crackling sound of the eggs hatching.”

4. (transitive)To incubate eggs; to cause to hatch.

   “I'm hatching this mysterious egg I found in the forest.”

5. (transitive)To devise (a plot or scheme).

   “World domination was only one of the evil schemes he had hatched over the years.”

   “As for Cersei, pretending to work with her enemies while secretly hatching some grander scheme was pretty much what I expected for the truce going into it.”

6. (transitive)To shade an area of (a drawing, diagram, etc.) with fine parallel lines, or with lines which cross each other (crosshatch).

   “Those hatching strokes of the pencil.”

   “Shall win this sword, silvered and hatched.”

7. (obsolete, transitive)To cross; to spot; to stain; to steep.

   “His weapon hatch'd in blood.”

name

1. A surname.