EXPERIMENTS WITH GUANO. 
23 
the fact of the buffalo very rarely being found east 
of it. Instead of rising in rank luxuriance like the 
prairie-grass, impeding the traveller in his march, 
it seldom is found elevated more than three inch¬ 
es, is thickly spread about, scarcely showing any 
bare spots of ground. In a word, where it is 
abundant, it forms a beautiful soft carpet, upon 
which the traveller treads with satisfaction and 
ease, and finds at night both himself and animals 
far less wearied than when plodding through the 
high grass in the early part of his journey. This 
grass sends up its leaves from a fasiculated bundle 
or union of its numerous delicate, spreading, fibrous 
roots at the very surface of the ground, which fa- 
siculus is about one quarter of an inch long, and 
from which is sent out, without the medium of 
any stalk, from eight to a dozen long, slender, ta¬ 
pering leaves, which are four or five inches in 
length, but which rise to an elevation of about 
three inches only, and then gracefully bend over 
to the ground. About one inch from the ground 
the leaves commence curling in a lateral direction 
to the tips, which are curved in the form of a ring, 
nearly touching the ground. From the main root 
or fasiculus is sent up a short delicate seed-stalk. 
My reasons for asserting that Captain Cook is 
mistaken in his application of the term “ buffalo” 
to the grama-grass, are, that I have been informed 
by very many trappers and New Mexicans of the 
names and distinctive characters of each, and that 
in no instance, have I ever heard, during the ex¬ 
perience of nearly two years, the name of buffalo- 
grass Applied to the grama , but on the contrary, 
have repeatedly had them pointed out to me by 
the above distinguishing names. By the Mexicans 
one is called “la grama,” and the other “la 
yerba de cibolo,” (buffalo-grass.) 
The grama is very abundant in the western 
valleys of the Rocky mountains, and about the 
sources and main branches of the river Bravo del 
Norte, and Colorado of the west, and at intervals 
in the intervening country between those rivers 
and the mountains of California, where it is also 
very abundant. 
These grasses might be introduced into the 
United States with great advantage. The buffa¬ 
lo grass being well adapted to the fatteningof ani¬ 
mals, and the grama for strengthening the horse, 
the ox, &c. J. H. Lyman. 
EXPERIMENTS WITH GUANO. 
We are permitted by Mr. Wakeman, Secretary 
of the American Institute, to make the following 
extracts from an address delivered October last 
before this body, by J. E. Teschemacher, Esq., of 
Boston, Massachusetts. 
In an address which I had the honor of deliver¬ 
ing before the Massachusetts Horticultural Society 
last year, I detailed a few experiments made by 
myself with the new manure from the coast of 
Peru, called guano, which is unquestionably the 
dung of sea-birds that has accumulated there in 
almost incredible masses, and which, owing to its 
never having been washed by rain, not only retains 
for ages its wonderful fertilizing power, but possi¬ 
bly possesses them in a concentrated state. 
I think this is a fit opportunity to give the re¬ 
sults of a continuation of some of these and other 
experiments, premising that every operation has 
been carried on by my own hands. But I would 
previously remark, that about four or five years 
ago, two cargoes of this manure were imported in¬ 
to England ; the following season this number was 
increased to six, and in twelve months, of 1842, and 
’43, this importation has increased to above 40,000 
tons, and that the sales in London alone since last 
January, have been from 250 to 500 tons weekly; 
those in Liverpool probably exceeding this amount. 
I should be quite willing to rest my belief of its 
immense importance to agriculture on these facts 
alone, even if I had not my own experience to con¬ 
firm it, although I am aware that several experi¬ 
ments have been made which have failed. In all 
those which I have heard of, the failure could al¬ 
ways be traced to some error in its application ; 
some had applied too much, for it is extremely 
powerful, and had killed their plants—others ap¬ 
plied it in ground already highly manured, its ef¬ 
fects were of course scarcely visible; others had 
applied it on dry soil at a dry season, when of 
course there were no means of its reaching the 
roots in a proper state. In Peru it is always ap¬ 
plied just previous to irrigation, for it never rains 
on that coast. 
On tbe 12th of May, this year, I sowed several 
hills of sweet-corn on a poor, exhausted, sandy 
soil, putting a tablespoonful of guano to each hill 
of 5 seeds, without any other manure. I feel sure 
that this quantity in sowing is two thirds too much, 
one teaspoonful would suffice, besides which it 
was not sufficiently stirred up with the soil, so 
that when the young tender sprouts first germina¬ 
ted, they came at once into contact with this most 
powerful manure, and were considerably injured, 
turning yellow, and several dying away. Three 
or four, however, in each hill survived and soon 
began to grow, of a dark green color. For the first 
three weeks I did not observe much difference be¬ 
tween these and some adjacent hills in the same 
soil, which I had sown also without manure, for 
the purpose of comparison. When about one foot 
high, I stirred into each hill about three teaspoon¬ 
fuls more guano, and watered all freely as the 
weather was very dry. On the 11th of July the 
tassels appeared, which is about a fortnight earlier 
than usual. When fit for gathering for the table, 
I exhibited at the rooms of the Massachusetts Hor¬ 
ticultural Society, the largest produce of one seed. 
It had three principal stems, two of which had 
three heads each, and one two heads, in all eight 
beads, besides five suckers, each of which showed 
the silk. The weight of this plant, the roots being 
cut off’, was Stp lbs. At the same time I exhibited 
the best produce of one seed out of the hills with¬ 
out guano or manure. One stalk showed one 
head, no sucker, and weighed lbs. It is well 
known by cultivators of this corn, that under the 
usual cultivation it seldom averages two heads to 
a seed. In my address before mentioned, the 
view I took of the action of this manure, and 
which I beg leave to state that 1 deduced theoret- 
