leppy
nounEtymology From Spanish lepra (“leprosy”).
1
US, Slang A young animal, particularly a cow calf or bull calf, a lamb, or a colt, which has been abandoned or orphaned.
- When those big bands take off, the mares never come back for those leppies. We were branding one time and saw a little bunch move out and a mom left a leppy behind.2006, Paula Morin, Honest Horses: Wild Horses in the Great Basin, page 105:
- Out on the range, he would have been a stunted leppy.2003, American Cowboy, volume 10, number 4, page 90:
1 more example
- I have heard a famous rodeo announcer crack the same old joke every year, "A leppy is a little calf whose ma has died, and whose pa has run away with another cow."1978, Sarah E. Olds, Twenty Miles From a Match: Homesteading in Western Nevada, page 44: