Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Edaphic
/ɪˈdafɪk/adjective
Relating to soil conditions and their effect on which plants can grow in a place.
The Greek roots
ἔδαφος
édaphos
ground, floor, bottom
Literally: “of the ground”
Follow a root:ἔδαφος1 word
The story of the word
Ecologists needed a word to separate what the soil does from what the weather does, so edaphic factors sit opposite climatic factors: drainage, pH, depth, chemistry. It explains the odd islands of vegetation you meet on chalk or on serpentine rock, where the plant list changes at a field boundary while the rainfall does not. Greek ἔδαφος meant the floor of a room or the bottom of a ship before it meant soil.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
edaphologypedology
In a sentence
The heathland survives on edaphic grounds alone, since the sand holds nothing.
Edaphic differences explain why the two slopes carry different trees.