moot earth en · NOUN
Etymology
moot (“tree stump”) + earth (“soil”)
Meanings
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(West-Country, uncountable) Soil taken from between the roots of a tree.
It is the nature of lime to attract oils, and dissolve vegetable bodies: Hence arise the good effects of lime in the improvement of black moorish land. Moot earth seems to consist of dissolved and half-dissolved vegetable substances, and it is said that lime assimilates the one, and dissolves the other.
1794, James MacPhail, “Of Manures, Earths &c”, in A Treatise on the Culture of the Cucumber, pages 510–511: