Carbonate commonly accumulates in weathering profiles developed on noncalcareous parent material under arid and semiarid climatic conditions. Such weathering profile types are widespread in Morocco, making it critical to know the sources of the calcium in order to understand the genesis of carbonate‐rich soils. In this study, we use 87Sr/86Sr as a geochemical tracer of the Ca sources in weathering profiles developed on volcanic rocks (basalt, tuff, andesite and latite) in the Mediterranean coast of Morocco. The results show that the most of the Sr, and hence Ca, is of an external origin, derived from (i) sea‐water for the profiles located near to the coast or (ii) sea‐water plus Liassic carbonate outcropping in the catchment for the profiles more distant from the coastline. The contribution of the host rock is small, being less than 25%. The ratio of the Sr (Ca) from the parent material to that from the external sources is controlled by the degree of porosity developed in the profile.

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