How to Use bone-dry in a Sentence

bone-dry

adjective
  • His legacy is akin to a cloth that’s been wrung bone-dry.
    Andre Gee, Rolling Stone, 4 May 2023
  • If your mum is bone-dry, give it a good soaking first, then place the plant in the hole.
    Brandee Gruener, Southern Living, 19 Nov. 2024
  • Its births were triggered by rainfall in the bone-dry desert.
    Abigail Tucker, Smithsonian Magazine, 23 June 2023
  • Then, a bone-dry second half of the year and sparse early winter snow left the landscape parched.
    Time, 22 Aug. 2023
  • Dry spells offer no challenge at all to this native of rocky and sandy, bone-dry soils.
    Paul Cappiello, The Courier-Journal, 16 Aug. 2024
  • Then prop it up on its side until bone-dry to further guard against warping.
    Alaina Chou, Bon Appétit, 17 Sep. 2024
  • My hair comes out of each wash whisper-soft and moisturized, a far cry from the wiry, bone-dry mop I was forced to work with pre-Jupiter.
    Jake Smith, Glamour, 22 Feb. 2023
  • This is Bungie executives trying to squeeze blood from a bone-dry stone.
    Paul Tassi, Forbes, 29 Nov. 2023
  • His mix of bone-dry humour and innate decency are the perfect foil for the film's welling emotions.
    The Week Uk, theweek, 21 Nov. 2024
  • The bone-dry air and meager plant coverage allows sunlight to heat up the desert surface.
    Khristopher J. Brooks, CBS News, 19 July 2023
  • The wind, fires and terrain filled with bone-dry vegetation from lack of rain in the area had formed a perfect storm for the disaster, Crowl said.
    Bill Hutchinson, ABC News, 9 Jan. 2025
  • On a recent day, the culverts were bone-dry, the only rushing sound from the highway traffic nearby.
    oregonlive, 9 June 2023
  • Joy, even for something as stupid as bone-dry pant cuffs, is not typical Milhouse.
    Bethy Squires, Vulture, 22 Nov. 2024
  • Hillsides were caked and brown, city streets were dotted with dead lawns, and wildfires raged throughout the state and region, feeding on bone-dry grass and shrubs.
    Hayley Smith, Los Angeles Times, 15 Apr. 2024
  • The entrance is tucked next to some shelves on the top floor; the interior is bone-dry, and reminiscent of a magical sauna.
    Sloane Crosley, Travel + Leisure, 1 July 2023
  • Water rolled off the jacket during testing, and the fabric remained bone-dry to the touch afterward.
    Grace Smith, People.com, 8 Jan. 2025
  • For the first time since 2005, a lake — called Lake Manly — has formed in Badwater Basin, an expanse of salt flats within the park that are usually bone-dry.
    Michael Charboneau, Los Angeles Times, 29 Feb. 2024
  • Strong Santa Ana winds and bone-dry conditions combined to heighten fire risks.
    Gary Robbins, San Diego Union-Tribune, 21 Jan. 2025
  • Like few places in the country, the state has had to reckon with the danger of weather whiplash — bone-dry conditions in the summer followed by pounding rain, deadly floods and dozens of feet of snow.
    Reis Thebault, Washington Post, 17 Mar. 2023
  • That has kept local vegetation bone-dry and highly flammable well into what is supposed to be the rainy season.
    Nathaniel Rakich, ABC News, 15 Jan. 2025
  • The rain should help alleviate the bone-dry conditions that have helped spread multiple wildfires across the region this month.
    Hannah Parry, Newsweek, 23 Jan. 2025
  • My dad remembers a teenage Jay, mop of curly brown hair and a bone-dry sense of humor, bodybuilding on dirt roads, with a rope harness strapped to his body, pulling an old Jeep like a horse pulling a buggy.
    Hailey Branson-Potts, Los Angeles Times, 9 Mar. 2023
  • Officials said the bounty made a dent in the state’s extreme drought conditions and offered some hope for strained water supplies after three bone-dry years.
    Hayley Smithstaff Writer, Los Angeles Times, 7 Mar. 2023
  • Cher’s unmistakable voice, which rings out, loud and clear, from every sentence: her compassion, her wisdom, her heart, and, of course, her bone-dry sense of humor.
    Liam Hess, Vogue, 25 Nov. 2024
  • With wetness all around, at least one team this March has intentionally kept its postgame celebrations bone-dry.
    Andrew Keh, New York Times, 31 Mar. 2023
  • These efforts are easily undone, however, by taking long, hot showers or sleeping in a bone-dry room for 8 hours.
    Adam Hurly, Robb Report, 6 Nov. 2023
  • With bone-dry conditions, Southern California high fire danger could linger into the new year.
    Andrew J. Campa, Los Angeles Times, 15 Dec. 2024
  • Experts blame the apocalyptic fires on months of bone-dry weather and the seasonal, Santa Ana winds reaching near-hurricane speeds.
    Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News, 8 Jan. 2025
  • For some trees, that has meant evolving the capacity to resist droughts — to extract tremendous amounts of water from seemingly bone-dry soil — a bur oak, for example.
    Paul Cappiello, The Courier-Journal, 13 Sep. 2024
  • But conditions are not normally bone-dry when the winds gust through the mountains of Southern California toward the Pacific coast.
    Denise Chow, NBC News, 9 Jan. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'bone-dry.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: