www.alphadictionary.com

living among or growing on rocks; rock inhabiting - RUPICOLINE (Bailey's list).

That's a terrific word that I've never heard. Of course, living in Florida, rocks exist in theory only. Sand, we have more than enough; but rocks?

How would one use that metaphorically? "The young groupie spent her weekends following local bands in a rupicoline fervor."

It was a word previously posted by someone named
Bailey,
and I' m not sure how to use it, exactly.

Living in Ireland one might make some reference to the
ever present rocks being dug up in the fields and piled
along the field boundaries, thus marking property.

Or in the Middle East youths get into a rupicoline fervor
and throw rocks at the police, as rocks are ever present
in Israel/Palestine.

But good word, flows off the tongue.

For a real usage, I'd say it would apply nicely to lichens, especially those that grow on the exposed rocks above the tree-line on mountains.

A rupicoline lichen.

There are probably a lot of lizards and such that make their homes among rocks.

I wonder if fishes that live among rocks would also
be considered thus.
And critters that live "under" rocks, the many-legged kind
and others, or would one have to put the prefix "sub-"
on the word?

Slava has it right for a proper use. Luke has raised a few good questions that I'll investigate for us, since this is up my alley. There is a family of words that is used to express where organisms live, e.g.,

nidicolous - in the nests of others
riparian (cf.) - along riverbanks
alpine - in mountains at high altitudes
boreal - in northern latitudes
septentrional - in southern latitudes
lacustrine - in or around lakes
palustrine - in a swamp
(et multi alii that I can't recall off the top of my head.)

Each generally applies only to those organisms that are compelled to life in those places.

Slava has it right for a proper use. Luke has raised a few good questions that I'll investigate for us, since this is up my alley. There is a family of words that is used to express where organisms live, e.g.,

nidicolous - in the nests of others
riparian (cf.) - along riverbanks
alpine - in mountains at high altitudes
boreal - in northern latitudes
septentrional - in southern latitudes
lacustrine - in or around lakes
palustrine - in a swamp
(et multi alii that I can't recall off the top of my head.)

Each generally applies only to those organisms that are compelled to life in those places.

Excellent list, I've seen several of these, but septentional and palustrine quite new.

As is nidiculous.

Now comes the modern bit: would we call Harry Potter nidiculous?

"Septentrional" in southern latitudes.
Meaning southern part of the globe? or southern part
of the nothern hemisphere?
- - strange word, which seems to have the Latin
word for "seven" as a sort of root. Where does that
come from?
-palustrine, I've heard, as well as the others.

In my haste, I misspoke <blush>. Septentrional means northern, not southern. Austral means southern. I think septentrional means northern parts of the northern hemisphere, but it may simply mean northern from one's point of reference. Austral, too (I think,) but I'm only basing this on how I've heard the words used.

Seems to me austral should group with boreal (and oriental/occidental)

Wikilore goes like this:

>> Septentrional is a word that means "of the north", rarely used in English but commonly used in Latin and in the Romance languages. Early maps of North America, mostly those before 1700, often refer to the northern- or northwestern-most unexplored areas of the continent at "Septentrional" or "America Septentrionalis", sometimes with slightly alternate spellings.

Etymology: >>The term septentrional, actually the adjectival form of the noun septentrion, itself refers to the seven stars of the Big Dipper asterism (aka "Septentrion"). <<

Yes, austral goes with boreal (from, I think, Boreus, a god representing the north wind.)

I don't know if there's an opposite to septentrional. I might recognize it if I hear it.

Of course, all of these north-south and east-west words predate Europe's realization of the length and breadth of the globe, so their precise use has become a bit fuzzy. When Japanese businessmen talk about their "eastern markets," they're talking about the west coast of the U.S.

And we speak of Middle East, Near East, Far East.

>>The term septentrional, actually the adjectival form of the noun septentrion, itself refers to the seven stars of the Big Dipper asterism (aka "Septentrion"). <<

...commonly known as the Pleiades, which in turn as our resident astronomer notes here, are known in Japan as Subaru (hence the company logo).

{edit: oops- no they're not. See below...}

Unless I missed something in translation,
the Pleiades and the Big Dipper (Ursa Major)
are not the same thing.

On the heals of the term "rupicoline"
Merriam/Webster's Word of the Day:

saxicolous
Meaning: inhabiting or growing among rocks.
As a graduate student, Pam studied saxicolous lichens above the treeline in three different parts of the Canadian Rockies.
It's not a word that exactly rolls off the tongue, but it's a useful designation for botanists. The word is from Latin, naturally. "Saxum" is Latin for "rock," and "colous" (meaning "living or growing in or on") traces back to Latin "-cola" meaning "inhabitant." Other "colous" offspring include "arenicolous" ("living, burrowing, or growing in sand"), "cavernicolous" ("inhabiting caves"), and "nidicolous" ("living in a nest" or "sharing the nest of another kind of animal"). All of these words were coined in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to describe the flora and fauna of our world.