Animal Report of the Consulting Cliemist. 
217 
nuneial phosphate. It is the special business ot the manure 
manufacturer to render these mineral phosphates soluble and 
efficacious, arid if he neglects to do this, the consumer should not 
be called upon to pay for constituents which, in an insoluble 
state, are of little or no value to him. 
Most of the samples of bone-dust analysed by me in 1871 were 
pure and of good quality ; some, however, were too damp ; and 
others, sold as raw bone, were mere mixtures of new and boiled 
bones (refuse bones of glue-makers). 
Boiled bones, being the refuse bones of glue-makers, are more 
energetic in their immediate effects upon vegetation than raw 
bone-dust, and are well suited for grass land ; but they are not 
so lasting in their effects. As they yield only from If to 2 per 
cent, of ammonia, whilst fresh bones yield fully 4^ per cent., 
boiled, or glue-maker's refuse bones, fetch a lower price than 
fresh bone-bust ; and for that reason the two kinds should be sold 
separately, under their right names. 
The price of sulphate of ammonia has risen during the last 
vear very much. Its present price is 21/. to 22/. per ton, and it is 
to be feared that this high price will be an inducement to unprin- 
cipled dealers to sell this valuable fertilizer in a more or less 
adulterated condition. I would therefore state that first quality 
sulphate of ammonia should contain 25 per cent, of ammonia, 
and second quality not less than 23 per cent. ; and I recommend 
that in all purchases the percentage of ammonia in the sulphate 
should be guaranteed by the vendor. 
In last year's Report I expressed the hope that the supply of 
guano from the Guanape Islands would turn out to be of a quality 
superior to that of some of the samples which were brought under 
my notice, and which I found very damp, lumpy, and compara- 
tively poor in ammonia. This hope, I regret to say, has not been 
fulfilled, for about three-fourths of the 78 samples of guano 
analysed by me in 1871 were Guanape guano, and the majority 
of them were very damp, lumpy, and altogether in a condition unfit 
lor direct application to the land. In most of the samples I found 
from 22 to 24 per cent, of water, and in some even a higher per- 
centage, and only a few yielded more than 11 per cent, of ammonia, 
whilst in a good many I found only from 8 to 10 per cent., and 
in some even less than 7 per cent, of ammonia. In consequence 
of the variable composition of Guanape guano, and the wet, 
unmanageable condition in which much of it has been delivered 
to the farmer, Peruvian guano has lost credit with the farmers of 
England. In former years such wet and inferior guanos were 
sold as sea-damaged, at prices varying with the composition and 
intrinsic value of the cargo. Daring the past season Guanape 
Island guano, no matter of what qualitv, was all sold by the 
