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BENEFIT OF GUANO. 
BENEFIT OF GUANO. 
I have gathered a great amount of information 
in my travels, upon this subject, some of which 
will be useful to your readers. 
I presume no part of the United States can 
show a more marked benefit from the use of 
this best and cheapest of all fertilisers in the 
world, than the northern neck of Virginia ; as 
in no part, with which I am acquainted, has it 
been so extensively used, and likely to be con- 
tinued to be used, upon the next wheat crop, as 
here. 
Mr. Willoughby Newton is entitled to the 
credit of having first introduced it into that 
section, and he now says that he looks upon it 
as an interposition of Providence, to save the 
country from total ruin, as most of the land had 
become so utterly exhausted as not to be worth 
cultivating, and nearly all the ridge or "forest 
land," as it is termed, had been abandoned as 
worthless, and suffered to grow up to old-field 
pines, which in time were cut down and burnt, 
and the land planted, and after bringing two or 
three miserable crops, suffered to grow up 
again. The soil is generally a sandy loam, 
based on a reddish-yellow clay, and in many 
places by shallow plowing and bad manage- 
ment, very much washed and its native fertility 
wasted. 
Mr. Newton's first experiment was upon such 
land, so " deadly poor "that it had long been 
considered useless to try to raise wheat, rye, or 
oats upon it, and it only afforded a very scanty 
crop of " poverty" or " hen grass." In 1846, he 
purchased a ton of Ichabo guano, about equal 
to half a ton of Peruvian, and put it upon eight 
acres, plowed in, upon which he sowed eight 
bushels of wheat, amid the jeers of some, and 
doubts of all his neighbors, that he never would 
see his seed returned to him in the crop. Even 
his negroes thought " massa hab done gone 
crazy sure, to tink he raise wheat on dat land, 
caze he put few pinch of snuff on him." The 
result, however, was 88 bushels, and a good 
stand of clover. 
In 1847, 'Mr. N. purchased $100 worth of Pat- 
agonian guano, and used it upon equally poor 
land, and obtained 330 bushels good wheat, 
when he certainly could not possibly have made 
100 bushels without guano, by the best manur- 
ing he would have been able to give it. In 1848, 
he used §200 worth of Patagonian and Chilian, 
at $40 per ton for one, and $30 for the other, 
and made 540 bushels of such fine wheat that it 
sold readily, for seed, at $1.25 per bushel. As 
these experiments were so very satisfactory 
upon the light lands, he wished to try what ben- 
efit guano would be to soil of a different char- 
acter. He therefore selected ten acres upon 
one of his Potomac farms, of a cold white clay, 
and applied one ton of Peruvian guano, which 
cost $50. His overseer declared " that stuff" 
never would make wheat and he would beat it 
upon the next ten acres, which to do, he dressed 
with lime, and plowed finely, and put in the 
wheat as well as he knew how. Finding in the 
spring, that the guanoed wheat was getting 
ahead, he gave his ten acres a good top-dressing 
of manure. The result was 55 bushels for the 
limed and manured lot, while the guanoed lot 
gave 135 bushels of a much better quality, 
which also sold at $1.25 per bushel, for seed. 
Here was a clear gain of $63.75 upon an outlay 
of $50, in one crop, ready money, besides the 
advantage to the land of getting a good growth 
of clover. In 1849, he used ten tons of Peruvian 
guano at $47, and ten tons of Patagonian, at 
$30, upon 260 acres of wheat, at the rate of 75 
to 250 lbs. guano to the acre, and the result now, 
(May 3d, 1850,) is so promising, that he has 
bought 30 tons of Peruvian, intending hereafter, 
to use no other kind, as the wheat now growing 
side by side, upon which the two kinds were 
applied, at equal cost, shows very largely in 
favor of the Peruvian. 
Upon one acre of sandy loam, in 1847, Mr. N. 
used one barrel of African guano, cost $4, and 
sowed one bushel Zimmerman wheat, and reaped 
17. He also used a barrel of "fertiliser," last 
fall, at the rate of $12 an acre, along side of 
guano, at $4 an acre. The present appearance 
of the crop is in exact inverse proportion. 
It is the concurrent opinion of Mr. N., and 
others who have used it most, that an applica- 
tion of 200 pounds per acre, plowed in deep, 
[How " deep ?" It will not do so well to plow 
guano in what we call 4; deep," in a north- 
ern climate. — Eds.,] and wheat sowed late, say 
last of October or first of November, is the most 
economical application, and that it will give an 
average increase of twelve bushels to the acre, 
for one of seed, upon poor land, and give a good 
stand of clover, that when turned in will give 
as good a crop as the first. 
The land upon which the above-named crops 
were made cost $4 an acre. Five miles from 
navigation, such land can be bought for less 
money. 
Wm. D. Nelson, of Westmoreland county, 
Virginia, a near neighbor of Mr. Newton, bought 
the land upon which he now lives, two years 
ago, at $1,600 for 400 acres. Three fourths of 
it was grown up in pines, and the balance, not 
paying interest of money in rent. The place 
was notoriously poor. It has a very different 
aspect now. Fine fields of wheat, knee high 
this backward spring, on the 1st of May, and 
most luxuriant clover, plainly tell what has 
been the renovating agent under a judicious 
management, to effect this great change. He 
used 200 pounds of Peruvian guano, and made 
12 bushels wheat to one sowed, to the acre; and 
200 lbs. Patagonian, and made 10 bushels to one. 
Upon eleven acres used 2,200 lbs., and 11 bush- 
els seed, and made 150 bushels of wheat. Upon 
36 acres and 36 bushels seed, on the same kind 
of land that had been manured well in previous 
corn crop, but not guanoed, made 152 bushels. 
The contrast now, between wheat that was gu- 
anoed and that without, is equal to the differ- 
ence between the green grass upon the wayside, 
and the bare beaten track. He plows in all 
his guano. Has bought ten tons Peruvian for 
1850. 
Dr. F. Faii-fax, of King-George county, Vir- 
ginia, commenced the use of guano, in 1847, 
