the.com/caliche
The desert's way of concreting itself shut, one mineral layer at a time.
means A hard, whitish layer of calcium carbonate that cements soil, sand, or gravel into a crust just below (or at) the desert surface — the bane of anyone trying to dig a fence post out there.
from From Spanish caliche, likely tracing back to Latin calx ('lime,' the same root that gives us 'calcium' and 'chalk'). The word traveled through Spanish-speaking regions of the Americas, where settlers and geologists needed a name for this stubborn, rock-like soil crust, and English simply borrowed it wholesale rather than invent its own.
- made of
- calcium carbonate cementing soil and gravel together
- forms when
- groundwater evaporates and leaves minerals behind
- construction nightmare
- diggers hate it more than actual rock
- also called
- hardpan, caprock, or the builder's curse word