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  • Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 207. The idiom today is bark up

  • the wrong tree. Okay. Let's take a look at the note here.

  • If someone is barking up the wrong tree, he or she has made the wrong choice or

  • is following the wrong course of action or accusing the wrong person of

  • something. So this could be used in several different ways. All right. Let's continue here. The origin of this phrase is believed to come from

  • hunting. A hunting dog will usually bark at the bottom of a tree in which a

  • hunted animal or bird is in to inform his master where the prey is. You know

  • where the hunted animal is. So he'll be barking ( ruff, ruff, ruff) at the bottom of the tree. Okay.

  • However, sometimes the hunted prey has already left. They're already gone or

  • moved on to another tree. Thus the dog is barking up the wrong

  • tree. Okay. Let's look at some examples here.

  • Example number one. Most conservative political commentators think Muller you

  • know, the special counsel Muller is barking up the wrong tree with his

  • investigation of Trump and Russian collusion after the 2016 elections. Yeah.

  • If they haven't found anything in almost two years. There's really probably

  • nothing there. There may have never been anything there. There might have been

  • some cheating in that 2016 election but it probably wasn't here. He's probably

  • barking up the wrong tree. He's following the wrong course of

  • action or possibly even accusing the wrong person.

  • Let's look at number two. If you major in Medieval Studies and expect to have many

  • good job opportunities when you graduate, you are barking up the wrong

  • tree. If you choose that major you will have limited job opportunities.

  • Yeah. So in this case again.You are probably following the wrong course. Your

  • following the wrong course of action if you want to have a good career and a lot of

  • job opportunities that's not the thing to major in. So you're barking up the

  • wrong tree in that sense, And let's look at the last

  • one. If you imagine that everything will be peaches and cream you know , everything

  • is sweet and perfect. And you will have a fairytale life by marrying into the

  • royal family you may be barking up the wrong tree. I'm sure there's a lot of

  • pressures behind the scenes of living in a royal family, A lot of expectations. You

  • have the media will be hunting you down and you know if you if you look at a

  • Princess Diana's life it didn't seem like a fairy tale. So if that was your

  • goal. Then by marrying into the royal family you may be barking up the wrong

  • tree. Okay. Anyway, I hope you got it. I hope it's clear. Thank you for your time.

  • Bye-bye.

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is Idioms 207. The idiom today is bark up

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