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THE COTTAGE GARDENER 
April 
So many question?! concerning Guano have reached 
us that we think it best to embody our answers in 
one general reply, from some part of which each of 
our correspondents may derive the information he 
respectively seeks. 
Although guano is a fertilizer new to the English 
cultivator, it is very far from being only recently 
employed to enrich the ground. In Peru it was ; 
employed to manure the soil when that portion of ' 
South America was first discovered; and its very 
name is evidence of the high estimation in which it 
was then held by even the ancient Peruvians, for 
guano, in their language, means the diuig, or the ma¬ 
nure, as if it was the especial or chief of all ferti¬ 
lizers. This, however, is not left to mere inference, 
for Garcilaso de la Vega, writing in 1609, says, “ In 
the time of the Incas (early sovereigns of Peru), 
there was so much vigilance in guarding the sea-fowl, 
that during the rearing season no person was allowed 
to visit the islands which they frequented, under paifi 
of death, in order that the birds might not be fright¬ 
ened and driven away from their nests. Each district 
had a portion of these islands allotted to it.” There 
are many places where guano, or the dung of sea- 
fowls, may be collected, as at Ichaboe and other 
islands tfi the coast of Africa; but none are equal to 
that from Peru, for the obvious reason that here less 
rain falls than in any other place where guano is 
found. The dung, therefore, is at once dried in layers 
by the heat of the sun, and each layer is so effectual 
in keeping the ammonia from escaping from the 
layers beneath it, that when they are dug into they 
actually emit fumes so pungent as to pain the eyes 
of the workmen almost insupportably. The large 
amount of rain falling in our latitudes is the : chief 
reason why there is no accumulation of guano on the 
islands about our northern coasts, which are so 
abundantly frequented by sea-fowl. 
Chemical analysis shews the cause of guano being 
so powerful a fertilizer. It abounds more than does 
any other with ammonia, the most active ingredient 
of all manures; and, besides this, it is very rich in 
phosphate of lime, a constituent of all plants; as well 
as in common salt and other ingredients, all useful as 
assistants to the growth of plants. The estimation in 
which guano is held as a fertilizer may be gathered 
from the most cogent fact, that the number of tons 
imported gradually increased, from 1733 tons in 1841, 
to 219,764 tons in 1845. In 1846, 89,220 tons were 
imported, but the decrease arose from the difficulty of 
obtaining a supply rather than from any decrease in 
the demand. Yet considerable discredit has been 
thrown upon this manure, as well as upon some 
who have sold it, by its extraordinary adulteration, 
amounting in several instances to 97 per cent. We, 
therefore, advise our readers to employ none but the 
best Peruvian guano, and to buy it either direct of 
tire London Manure Company or from one of their 
agents. There are other dealers of equal respecta¬ 
bility, bilt we know that this Company may be de¬ 
pended upon for supplying it genuine. 
We now come to consider the different garden 
crops to which guano has been applied successfully, 
and the experiments published ; but we must advise 
our readers that we believe there is no crop in their 
flower, kitchen, or fruit-garden, to which it may not 
be beneficially applied, if proper care is taken not to 
give it either in excess or at a time when the plant 
is not growing healthfully. When guano has been 
| found not of advantage, it has been either because 
these circumstances have not been attended to or 
because, the manure was adulterated. 
The w r ant of common sense in trying experiments 
with manures would exceed our belief if we had not 
had many years of intercourse with those “whose 
talk is of bullocks.” For instance, we know one 
party who tiled the efficacy of common salt as a 
manure for potatoes by using cut sets, putting them 
into the ground with a dibble, and filling the holes 
with the salt! Not oue of the pickled sets, of course, 
vegetated. Another worthy gentleman mixed his 
carrot seed with guano before sowing, and then put 
it in drills, adding a little guano over the seed. 
Scarcely a plant came up, for the ammonia of the 
manure destroyed the little tender roots as soon as 
they burst from the seed. We mention these occur¬ 
rences as a hint to our readers that discretion and 
judgment are requisite in experiments with manures, 
and especially with one so powerfrtl as guano. 
A very wholesome warning is offered upon this 
point by the experiments af Mr. Maund, the editor 
of that excellent periodical “The Botanic Garden.” 
“ When applied to strawberries once a week in a 
liquid state (four ounces to a gallon), guano made 
them very vigorous and productive; but sprinkled 
upon some young seedlings of the same fruit it killed 
them. Two ounces per yard (five cwt. per acre), were 
sprinkled over onions, and they doubled the untreated 
in size. Potatoes manured with one ounce and a 
half per yard, were rendered much more luxuriant 
than others having no guano. Brussels sprouts were 
half destroyed by being planted in immediate contact 
with nine parts earth and one part guano. Gera¬ 
niums were greatly injured by liquid manure of guano 
(four ounces per gallon); but ‘ plants of various sorts 
in pots, watered only with guano-water, half an ounce 
to a gallon, have flourished astonishingly; none have 
failed. These are lessons which cannot be mistaken-' 
—( Auctarium, 223 .) Mr. Rendle and other persons 
record, as the result of dearly-purchased experience, 
that where gitiuo has failed to be beneficial, or has 
been injurious, kt has been applied in quantities too 
powerful for the plants to bear. In a liquid state, 
half an ounce per gallon, and given to growing plants 
once a week, it never fails to be productive of vigour. 
Applied to the pine-apple it has been found highly 
beneficial; and mixed with poor loam or mere sand, 
it made, in the London Horticultural Society’s gar¬ 
den, the salvias and verbenas grow luxuriantly; but it 
was too stimulating, and proved deleterious, when 
applied to them in conjunction with a fertile soil. 
These .faots have been corroborated by experiments 
