amatho-, amath-, amathi- +

A plant that grows in sandy places.

Inhabting sandy plains.

To dwell in sandy places, as in a desert.

A large variety of creatures; for example, scorpions and spiders, are protected against water loss by their thick and hard body coverings that allows them to amathocole successfully in sandy deserts, as in the Mojave Desert of Southern California.

Divination by observing the arrangement of sand, dust, or dirt: In the newspaper article that Susan read, there was a person who believed in amathomancy and thought that the patterns that sand made on the ground indicated what her day was going to be like.

A creature that lives in sandy plains or soils: A sand crab is a good example of an amathophile that is very mobile in sandy beaches.

An excessive horror of contaminations and germs: Those suffering from amathophobia also include dust as part of their anxieties.

Some people who are affected with amathophobia keep the windows in their residences closed at all times and install elaborate air-filtering equipment.

There are also individuals who constantly wipe surfaces and clean their living quarters so often that they may be considered to have an obsessive-compulsive disorder known as amathophobia.

In biology, regarding a life form that thrives in the strand line of a sandy seashore: Some psamathophilous organisms that prefer sandy beach life can be shellfish and insects.

A strandline plant or a sandy seashore.