1/2 V MADRAS FISHERIES BULLETIN VOL. XIII, 



The cost of the simple buildings and plant is very small, 

 probably from Rs. 2,000 to Rs. 4,000, while some of the more 

 objectionable " factories " have cost less, and are those which give 

 the most trouble whether in their condition or in the adulteration 

 of the guano with sand or with common beach-dried fish. 



53. Plant. — This is of the simplest, viz., in general one or two 

 iron boiling pans, of U-shaped section, about 8 feet in length and 

 capable of taking at most a ton of fish, usually somewhat less, and 

 built in masonry over an open fire : from two to four manual presses 

 of very fair local construction on patterns suggested by the 

 Fisheries Department, with a number of coir press bags, a couple 

 of separating pits, and a storage tank for the separated oil. The 

 drying ground for the guano should be a " barbecue" or platform 

 of concrete or at least of hard earth, sufficient to accommodate two 

 or three days output ; this, however, is often lacking or defective, 

 and much is dried on the sand with consequent disadvantage to the 

 purity of the guano. A store for the guano usually completes the 

 buildings, the oil being either kept in a masonry pit, or in barrels 

 in the open or under a simple shed. A more or less complete drain, 

 of earthenware pipes or an open channel, takes away the waste 

 water, either to the sea or backwater or into the sand. 



54. At the Government Yard, Tanur, arrangements though still 

 simple are more advanced : there are good sheds, with roofs of 

 corrugated iron supported on brick pillars, thus permitting complete 

 light and ventilation ; the floor is cemented throughout. Two small 

 copper boiling pans with open fire are in use for small parcels or 

 experiments, but the regular pans are steam driven, being long 

 narrow U-shaped pans with a perforated steam pipe under a false 

 perforated bottom of wood; the material of the pans is masonry, 

 iron, or wood. Two experimental pans are made of 1 10 gallon 

 hogsheads with a perforated flexible steam pipe down the centre : 

 the barrel turns on trunnions, so that it can be tilted at once into a 

 receiving trough. The ordinary longitudinal pans have large 

 sluice valves, and after the best oil has been skimmed off, the mass 

 is run off into drainage tanks or boxes, provided with perforated 

 false bottoms through which much of the oil and water drains off" 

 into the separating pits; this oil is usually better than pressed oil, 

 but is not now kept separate from the latter, the object of the 

 draining being to render the hot mass less fluid and more easily 

 handled. The manual presses are placed close to the draining 



