caliche

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English

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English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
Caliche (form of sodium nitrate)
An exposed layer of chalk overlain with caliche

Etymology

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From Spanish caliche, from Latin calx (pebble); compare chalk.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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caliche (countable and uncountable, plural caliches)

  1. (mineralogy) A crude form of sodium nitrate from South America; used as a fertilizer.
  2. A layer of hard clay subsoil or sedimentary rock; hardpan.
    • 1929, Soil Survey of Potter County, Texas, US Bureau of Chemistry and Soils, page 44:
      According to local well drillers, in wells drilled on the high plains a few hundred feet back from the caliche escarpment or in other locations on the high plains in this area no hard caliche or white layer, such as would characterize a soft layer of high lime-carbonate content, is generally reached at a depth corresponding to the elevation of the caliche escarpment.
    • 1985, Julie Behrend Weinberg, Growing Food In the High Desert Country, page 17:
      Having a layer of caliche at depths of 16 inches and less really puts a damper on the garden site. The caliche does not allow roots to penetrate it (tree roots often take 10 years to break through a caliche layer) nor does this mineral allow water to drain.
    • 2011, Hüseyin Yalçin, Ömer Bozkaya, “Chapter 7: Sepiolite-Palygorskite Occurrences in Turkey”, in Arieh Singer, Emilio Galan, editors, Developments in Palygorskite-Sepiolite Research, page 186:
      Caliche in various forms, namely powdery, nodule, tube, fracture-infill, laminar crust, hard laminated crust (hardpan) and pisolitic crust, is widespread in the Mersin area in southern Turkey (Eren et al., 2008; Kadir and Eren, 2008).

Translations

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Anagrams

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Sardinian

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From Latin calix, calicem, itself a borrowing from Ancient Greek κύλιξ (kúlix).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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caliche m (plural caliches)

  1. (Nuorese) cup, wine glass, chalice

Spanish

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Etymology

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From Latin calx (pebble).

Noun

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caliche m (plural caliches)

  1. saltpeter
  2. salitre
  3. (El Salvador) jargon
    Synonym: jerga

Further reading

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