# What does slough (pronounced "slew") mean to you? Quick!! **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 3, 2010, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970 "2010-08-03T03:25:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilarity_n.suze/32/6223_2.png) [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/41 "2010-08-03T07:25:20Z")
My inclination on seeing the word would be to pronounce it “sluff” and the meaning to discard a card that isn’t the suit led and not a trump. However, if I saw it capitalized, as a name, then I would think of it as “slew” and some kind of water thing. Maybe a pond. Unless I was reading Pilgrim’s Progress and the name was Slough of Despond, in which case I would pronounce it “slaw” and think of it as a really murky pond, or a stock tank, but with a low water level and lots of mud. Er…California, Texas, Colorado, Oklahoma. I’m thinking I did not see this in Texas. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/42 "2010-08-03T08:28:15Z")
To walk with difficulty through snow, swampland or similar terrain; figuratively, to perform a tiresome job (“slough through a pile of paperwork”). No idea where the heck I got it from. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 8:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/43 "2010-08-03T08:31:15Z")
Without reading thread: it means for a surface layer to fall or peel off. “The monster’s skin sloughed off”, “the topsoil of the hill sloughed off”. I just picked it up reading it in various books of fiction. ---
**Author:** ![si\_blakely](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@si\_blakely](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/si_blakely)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/44 "2010-08-03T09:11:51Z")
Slough: (rhymes with plough) - a muddy, marshy area that is hard to escape from - as in _the slough of despond_ in The Pilgrims Progress. Also the name of a city in the UK, with exactly the same connotations of depression and inescapability. also pronounced sluff, to shed or discard. Si ---
**Author:** ![VarlosZ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d78d45/32.png) [@VarlosZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VarlosZ)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/45 "2010-08-03T09:55:30Z")
I wasn’t familiar with the “sloo” word or pronunciation, just “sluff,” to shed or cast off. (Oh, and I’m a city boy, born and raised in Manhattan.) ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/46 "2010-08-03T10:38:00Z")
> [@Oly](#): > > Please answer before reading others’ responses. And include, if you will, from where in the world you learned what it is. No dictionaries allowed! This word seems to have different meanings in different places. > > My definition and place: > > Slough: A side channel to a river, under the influence of tide waters. Place: southern Oregon coast, USA. My definition is similar the OP’s. North Carolina coast, USA. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/47 "2010-08-03T11:48:21Z")
A small temporary pond, not on a permanent stream, that dries up. I’m from Southern Ontario, but my mom was from Saskatchewan. ---
**Author:** ![Staggerlee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/staggerlee/32/3134_2.png) [@Staggerlee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Staggerlee)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/48 "2010-08-03T11:49:14Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > To walk with difficulty through snow, swampland or similar terrain; figuratively, to perform a tiresome job (“slough through a pile of paperwork”). No idea where the heck I got it from. I would use the word ‘slog’ in place of that, though maybe ‘slog’ is just a verb derived from ‘slough’, to describe trying to escape from one. I’ve only known the word up 'til now as the placename and for skin-shedding. ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/49 "2010-08-03T12:03:38Z")
It’s a cut off section of a river channel. It can be completely cut off from the river or still connected at one end. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/50 "2010-08-03T12:26:13Z")
Marshy wetlands. Learned from On The Shores of Silver Lake, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. ---
**Author:** ![SecondJudith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@SecondJudith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SecondJudith)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/51 "2010-08-03T12:31:18Z")
I’ve never heard it pronounced “slew”. If it were pronounced to rhyme with “tough”, I would define it as throwing or casting off something, and if it rhymed with “plough”, I would think of the town that’s a stop on the rail line from Paddington to Reading. ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/52 "2010-08-03T12:37:02Z")
If it was spell sluagh, and pronounced the same way, the unseelie “army” or perhaps spelled the same, a whole big bunch of something. ---
**Author:** ![BlakeTyner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@BlakeTyner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlakeTyner)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/53 "2010-08-03T12:38:37Z")
It’s a slow-to-non-moving body of water, usually where a creek or bayou backs up after a nice rainy season, and a good place to get crawfish. Northeast Texas–my father said it, and pronounced it “slew.” ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/54 "2010-08-03T12:49:38Z")
a small pond, usually muddy, on the Canadian prairies. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/55 "2010-08-03T12:54:57Z")
> [@spoike](#): > > > [@Gorsnak](#): > > > > A small pond, usually just a low spot in a field with standing water after spring melt. May or may not contain water year round. > > > > Western Canada > > Pretty much the same definition, with the addition of man-made rectangular ponds also being called sloughs. > > Alberta and Saskatchewan I’ve always thought of sloughs as being natural; man-made rectangular ponds are “dug-outs.” Probably just a matter of usage. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Woo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7c8e57/32.png) [@Dr.Woo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Woo)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/56 "2010-08-03T13:20:16Z")
As a noun pronounced “slew”, it’s a creek or small waterway in a marshy, delta area. I learned that in the Sacramento delta of California. My favorite one is still Whiskey Slough, where my uncle would take us fishing for catfish when we were little. I remember when I first saw the word on a map and realized “Oh, _that’s_ how you spell it!” ---
**Author:** ![nolonger\_lurking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/41988e/32.png) [@nolonger\_lurking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nolonger_lurking)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/57 "2010-08-03T13:53:03Z")
It might be a regional or alternate pronunciation, but I pronounce slough as “sluff” and take it to mean shedding or breaking free- to slough off. Slew, I thought was spelled as pronounced, and meant to slide of drift off-angle. ETA: well, that’s embarrassing ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/58 "2010-08-03T13:56:27Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > > [@spoike](#): > > > > Pretty much the same definition, with the addition of man-made rectangular ponds also being called sloughs. > > > > Alberta and Saskatchewan > > I’ve always thought of sloughs as being natural; man-made rectangular ponds are “dug-outs.” Probably just a matter of usage. I have the same distinction between “slough” (wild) and “dugout” (man-made). ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/le_ministre_de_l_au-dela/32/12181_2.png) [@Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/59 "2010-08-03T13:56:47Z")
A shallow, marshy pond which is abundant in algae and rather stinky. May also be where the run-off from the barns and pastures drains to. I would swim or wade in a pond, I would never swim in a slough. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970/60 "2010-08-03T13:59:17Z")
“Slew” = marshy tidal inlet. 'Round here, we’ve got the Alviso, Elkhorn, and Grizzly Bay sloughs. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-slough-pronounced-slew-mean-to-you-quick/548970.md?page=4)