like a duck to water

L

like a duck to water,
also, like a duck takes to water

Meaning

  • to do something very quickly and enjoy doing it.
  • easily and naturally.
  • to have the usual aptitude to do something.

Examples in Sentences

  1. She’s taken to her grandmother’s house like a duck to water.
  2. Miranda took to motherhood like a duck to water.
  3. She began skating and discovered how quickly she took to it, like a duck to water.
  4. Chris is really a natural surfer. Even before he began surfing professionally, he took to it like a duck to water.
  5. Every year, we discuss the American girls who come over and take to baseball like a duck to water.

Origin

To take to anything quickly and immediately, as if it were part of the routine, is to take to something like a duck to water. Like all other water birds, ducks are born on land but fledge into the water without needing to learn to swim. One could assume that the phrase “like a duck to water” has been used ever since people first noticed ducks swimming into water.

Certainly, the phrase began to appear in print in the early 1800s and gradually gained popularity in American English.

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