Brett:

poikliotherm - varying heat
homeotherm - "same" (static) heat
endotherm - internal heat
ectotherm - external heat

You will see many other terms in various discussions of thermal
physiologies - heliotherm (literally sun-heat, i.e. getting heat from
the sun), thermoconformers etc.

Merriam-Webster's online, and other research publications, employ
teams of very highly-payed people to do nothing but detailed research
into this sort of stuff. I would not dream of clouding their
judgements (and thus undermining their reasonably large paychecks) by
bringing to their attention some basic terminology that should be
evident if they were to pick up any (good) college-level ecology,
zoology or physiology textbook!


> Thanks for an enlightening post.  After reading it, I looked up these terms
> in Websters online ( http://www.m-w.com/dictionary.htm ) for my own
> interest.  While they make an attempt to clarify poiklotherm(ic), their
> explanation for the other three terms are basically restricted to:
> 'xxxx-blooded'.
> 
> I only mention this due to your Paragraph 2 "wish", which is
less likely to
> come true with this type of resource providing the high-school definition.
> A quick note to them via their online form at (
> http://www.m-w.com/info/contact.htm ) might start a ball rolling to at least
> help your wish along (it seems you'd only need to edit to post above.)
> FWIW.  Regards, Brett.
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