Hard Soil

 

 

 

"But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root." Matt 13:6

 I have been reading about gardening again and was examining dirt once more. In Matt 13:6-8 God talks about four kinds of soil: hard, weedy, rocky and rich. Today we are going to talk about hard soil. I was born in Arizona so I know alot about desert soils, Deserts are typically composed of dunes, mountains and desert flats.

Usually when we talk about dirt people are just referring to the top or O layer, but dirt has many layers. The physical properties and appearance of deserts can depend on the type, location, climate, minerals, and other environmental factors. Desert soil characteristics, which generally apply to any type of desert soil, include (but are not limited to) a mostly sandy soil composition, very little moisture, and lack of nutrients. When it comes to deserts, 90-95% of their composition is sand. If you remember this means that is has a very high permeability water percolates right through it, but it dies have a high porosity so there are lots of air pockets. The horizons in a desert soil usually start with a hard desert pavement as the top layer –  desert soils are dry, the surface remains compacted and brittle.Below the thin first layer of humus, the layers of the desert soil usually include thick, dry accumulations of clay, calcium carbonate, and soluble salts, along with a rocky parent material.

The heat typically found in deserts has two effects it hardens and pavements the top layer of soil and the high rate of evaporation pulls salt and calcium up and makes the soil increasingly hard and salty. 

Many desert soils contain prominent, whitish layers called calcic horizons. These are accumulations of calcium carbonate, the same material found in chalk, concrete, and agricultural lime. Thick, strongly-cemented calcic horizons take a long time to form. They start as thin, patchy coats of whitish calcium carbonate on the lower surfaces of pebbles and small stones. In fine-grained parent materials, such as dune sand, that lack coarse materials, calcium carbonate first appears as thin, white, thread-like accumulations where small roots have extracted soil water and caused the calcium carbonate to precipitate. Eventually, additional accumulation of calcium carbonate fills the soil interstices between pebbles or nodules and the calcic horizon becomes plugged, greatly restricting the downward movement of water. Once this occurs, calcium carbonate continues to accumulate on the top of the calcic horizon in hard, cemented layers and may literally engulf and obscure overlying soil horizons in the process. It takes many tens to hundreds of thousands of years for such strongly-developed calcic horizons to form. Sometimes hard, whitish caliche becomes exposed on the surfaces of very old soils when erosion removes overlying, less erosion-resistant soil horizons. These partly eroded soils are very common throughout the desert and are called truncated soils. This is why when the desert does get water it is prone to flash floods because the water cannot percolate through the caliche layer.

The consequences of salinity are:detrimental effects on plant growth and yield, reduction of water quality for users, sedimentation problems, increased leaching of metals, especially copper, cadmium, manganese and zinc and soil erosion ultimately, when crops are too strongly affected by the amounts of salts.

Amazingly some plants and animals are adapted to these desert soils . Desert animals have evolved ways to help them keep cool and use less water. Camels can go for weeks without water, and their nostrils and eyelashes can form a barrier against sand. Jackrabbits and desert foxes have huge ears to help regulate heat. Many desert animals, such as the fennec fox, are nocturnal, coming out to hunt only when the brutal sun has descended. Some animals, like the desert tortoise in the southwestern United States, spend much of their time underground. Most desert birds are nomadic, crisscrossing the skies in search of food. And among insects, the Namib desert beetle can harvest fog from the air for water. Because of their very special adaptations, desert animals are extremely vulnerable to changes in their habitat.

Desert plants may have to go without fresh water for years at a time. Some plants have adapted to the arid climate by growing long roots that tap water from deep underground. Other plants, such as cacti, have special means of storing and conserving water. Their waxy skins prevent transpiration and their needles prevent predators from stealing their water.

So what dies this tell us about our hard soil? If our soil is hard we are desperate for Living Water when we are exposed it often just rolls off us. We are not feeding our souls because we are lacking spiritual nutrients. It takes alot of time for desert soils to get water flowing through them. We have so much spiritual salt that it is toxic to our spiritual growth. The good news is that the soil is always evolving and there are some plants that can grow even in this harsh environment. Those that do blume have deep, depp tap roots and can bear many trials and tribulations.