It means ‘like or of a duck.’ This is the result of a discussion between my wife, myself, and the newborn: we needed to work out what was a more highfalutin word for ‘ducklike’ –
Because ‘Defeat him, my ducklike minions!’ doesn’t have the right sound to it, of course. This was a conversation between me and my wife, remember?
– and so, we had to reverse-engineer on the spot back from the Latin word for duck (anatis, which we looked up). As ‘ursus’ (bear) becomes ‘ursine’ (bearlike) and ‘leo’ (lion) becomes ‘leonine’ (lionlike), we assumed that ‘anatis’ would become ‘anatine’ – and lo! It did. And if you don’t like it, I shall unlease my new anatine minions upon you.
See? Much superior.
Moe Lane
PS: ‘Crustacean minions’ is already sufficiently awesome that I don’t really need to come up with an alternative, but I appreciate your input.