-cola, -colas; -cole; -colent; -colid; -coline; -colous

(Latin: to inhabit; to live in, to live on, to live among; to dwell; living among, dwelling in; occurring on, occurring in)

Suffixes that refer to the location or an area of growth. Used primarily in botanical and biological terminology to indicate a plant or an organism that is characterized by a habitat or place of existence as indicated by the combining root.

The suffix -cole is derived from Latin colere, "to inhabit, to dwell, to live".

If you want to see more details about a "Source" link under any of the entries in this unit, click on it and you will be taken to the Bibliography of Habitat and Dwelling Environments unit and there you can find the book by scrolling down until you see the TITLE of the book in GREEN.

Don't confuse this -cole, -cola , "inhabit, live in, dwelling in" unit with the following cole-, coleo- (sheath, scabbard, vagina); coll-, col- (neck); collo-, coll- (glue); colo-, col- (colon, large intestine); and colon-, coln- (farm, settlement) units.

subxerocole (verb), subxerocoles; subxerocoled; subxerocoling: dry
Living and thriving in moderately dry environments.
sylivicolous (adjective), more sylivicolous, most sylivicolous
sylvicole (verb), sylvicoles; sylvicoled; sylvicoling: forest, woods
Inhabiting or existing in woodlands.
sylvicoline (adjective), more sylvicoline, most sylvicoline
Characteristic of those forms of life that inhabit woods or forests; such as, birds, plants, animals, etc.
sylvicolous (adjective), more sylvicolous, most sylvicolous
sylvine (adjective), more sylvine, most sylvine
syrtidocole (verb), syrtidocoles; syrtidocoled; syrtidocoling
Existing and occurring on dry sand-bars.
tegulicole (verb), tegulicoles; tegulicoled; tegulicoling
Living on tiles; such as, lichens.
tegulicolous (adjective), more tegulicolous, most tegulicolous
telmicole (verb), telmicoles; telmicoled; telmicoling: marsh
Living in fresh-water marshes.
telmicolous (adjective), more telmicolous, most telmicolous
termiticole (verb), termiticoles; termiticoled; termiticoling: termite
Living in termite nests.
termiticolous (adjective), more termiticolous, most termiticolous
terricole (verb), terricoles; terricoled; terricoling
To live on or in soil: Some organisms, like earthworms, terricole most of their active lives in the ground, but not in aquatic regions and not up in the air.
terricoline, terricolous (adjective) (not comparable)
A reference to an organism that spends most of its active life on the ground or in the soil: The mole, a burrowing insectivore, is a good example of a terricoline animal.

For more details about plants and animals living together, go to this Habitats for the Living page.

The list of books or the resources that were used to compile the information for this unit are available at this Bibliography of Habitat and Dwelling Environments unit.


You may take a self-scoring quiz over some of the words in this section by clicking on this -cole, -colus quiz to check your word knowledge for this unit or even learn some of the words via this quiz.

Related life, live-word units: anima-; bio-; vita-; viva-.