In another of our blog posts on Spanish nouns that can be either masculine or feminine depending on meaning we look at caza.
You can listen to the pronunciation of caza in the audio clip below:
In most cases, caza, like most typical nouns ending in -a, is feminine. It can refer to any type of activity involving the pursuit and capture or killing of animals, so it is typically equivalent to hunting or, if the emphasis is on marksmanship, shooting:
Los hombres se dedicaban a la caza y a la pesca.
Men spent their time hunting and fishing.
la campaña contra la caza de ballenas
the campaign against whale hunting or whaling
La caza de la perdiz acabará el 4 de enero.
Partridge shooting will finish on 4 January.
Caza (feminine) is also used of other types of serious search or hunt:
Este asesinato confirma que se ha iniciado una caza de ‘traidores’.
This murder confirms that a hunt for ‘traitors’ has begun.
Hay una caza de brujas dentro de la policía.
There’s a witch hunt going on in the police.
Estaba de nuevo a la caza de su autógrafo.
I was again on the hunt for his autograph.
Caza (feminine) can also refer to hunted animals or game (whether alive or dead):
Había abundancia de caza, cabras montesas, ciervos, jabalíes y otras especies que servían para el sostenimiento de la población.
There was plenty of game, wild goats, deer, boar and other species which were used to sustain the population.
Because it is short for el avión de caza, caza is masculine when it means a fighter plane:
El caza F-16 es utilizado por varias fuerzas aéreas alrededor del mundo.
The F-16 fighter jet is used by a number of different air forces around the world.
Come back next week for another in our series on Spanish nouns whose gender varies according to sense.
