alkali soil

noun

1. soil that has either a high degree of alkalinity or a high percentage of sodium, or both, so that most crops cannot be grown in it profitably.

alkali soil

noun

1. a soil that gives a pH reaction of 8.5 or above, found esp in dry areas where the soluble salts, esp of sodium, have not been leached away but have accumulated in the B horizon of the soil profile

Word History and Origins

Origin of alkali soil¹

First recorded in 1910–15

Example Sentences

Instead of a hard, barren, unproductive soil, as they had been told, it proves to be a light rich clay loam all through the Wallamet Valley, and in the interior, a dark, mellow, inexhaustible alkali soil, of the richest kind, and, when properly cultivated, very productive.

From Project Gutenberg

The most of this vast, high, rolling plain, and especially the valleys, have more or less of alkali soil; the high plains are similar to those we have just passed,—destitute of all kinds of timber, except at the foot of the mountains, and small patches of willow and cotton-wood, in some little nook or corner, near some spring or stream.

From Project Gutenberg

He was on the main road now and the dry alkali soil, being unsuitable for any kind of cultivation, opened up in great vistas of space.

From Project Gutenberg

A brightly splotched variety lives in Arizona's Painted Desert, a drab single-toned variety on the drab soil of Oregon, a white variety on the white alkali soil of the Amargosa Desert, a black variety on the West's black lava belts.

From Time Magazine Archive

On the other hand, an excess of soluble magnesium salts in the soil produces definite toxic effects upon plants, magnesium compounds being known to be among the most destructive of the "alkali soil" salts.

From Project Gutenberg