Guano: a Treatise of Practical Information for Farmers

Part 1

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GUANO:

A Treatise of Practical Information for Farmers;

CONTAINING

PLAIN DIRECTIONS HOW TO APPLY PERUVIAN GUANO

TO THE VARIOUS

CROPS AND SOILS OF AMERICA,

WITH A

BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF ITS HISTORY, LOCALITY, QUANTITY, METHOD OF PROCURING, PROSPECT OF CONTINUED SUPPLY, AND PRICE; ANALYSIS OF ITS COMPOSITION, AND VALUE AS A FERTILIZER, OVER ALL OTHER MANURES.

"If the experience of the last few years has taught us one thing more certainly than another, it is the unfailing excellence of Guano for every kind of crop which requires manure."

PREPARED AND PUBLISHED

BY SOLON ROBINSON,

FOR

MESSRS. F. BARREDA & BROTHER,

AGENTS FOR THE PERUVIAN GOVERNMENT AT BALTIMORE;

AND

THEODORE W. RILEY, ESQ., THEIR AGENT IN NEW YORK.

NEW YORK: 1853.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by

SOLON ROBINSON,

in the Clerks Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

INTRODUCTION

The rapidly increasing use of guano, in the United States, and the growing conviction upon the public mind, that it is the cheapest and best purchasable manure in the world, together with the fact of a great want of information among American farmers, as to the best mode of applying it to the soil, has induced the agents of the Peruvian Government for the sale of guano in the United States, to employ the author of this pamphlet to collect and publish such information.

It is hoped the favorably and well known name of the author, as an agricultural writer and traveller, together with his extended opportunities of witnessing the application and effect of guano upon the various soils and climates of this country, will give this work such a character, as to induce every improving farmer, gardener, or horticulturist, in America to give it a careful perusal. The author believes it will be found to contain all and much more than its title imports, and be of great value to every person using or dealing in guano; as the analysis, not only of the pure article is given, but that of several specimens of adulterated samples, so as to enable the farmer to avoid being cheated by base counterfeits.

The author will be much obliged to any gentleman who will furnish him for publication in future editions of this work, or in the columns of THE AGRICULTOR, any details of experiments in the use of Peruvian guano, which will be useful to the farmers of this country, as it is his desire, as well as the guano agents, to give them useful facts; not only to increase the sale, but the fertility of the land, and wealth of the owners.

With assurances to my friends that I have no other interest in the increased consumption of guano, I am most sincerely and respectfully

Your old Friend,

SOLON ROBINSON.

Part 2

New York, October 1852.

A TREATISE ON GUANO.

PERUVIAN GUANO--ITS USES AND BENEFITS.

Of all manures procurable by the American Farmer, guano from the rainless islands of Peru, is perhaps not only the most concentrated--the most economical to the purchaser--but by its composition, as we will show by analysis, the best adapted to all the crops cultivated in this country requiring manure. For wheat, especially, it is the one thing needful. The mineral constituents of cultivated plants, as will also be shown by analysis, are chiefly lime, magnesia, potash, soda, chlorine, sulphuric and phosphoric acid; all of which will be found in Peruvian guano. Nitrogen, the most valuable constituent of stable or compost manures, exists in great abundance in guano, in the exact condition required by plants to promote rapid vegetation. The concentration of all these valuable properties in the small bulk of guano, renders it particularly valuable to farms situated in districts unprovided with facilities of cheap transportation. In some hilly regions, it would be utterly impossible to make any ordinary manure pay for transportation. With guano the case is very different--one wagon will carry enough with a single pair of horses to dress 12 or 16 acres; while of stable manure it would require as many or more loads to each acre to produce the same effect.

But this is not the greatest advantage in the use of this fertilizer; the first application puts the land in such condition, that judicious after cultivation renders it continuously fertile by its own action of productiveness and reproductiveness of wheat, clover and wheat, by turning in the clover of one year for the wheat of the next, and by returning the straw back to the ground where it grew, spread open the surface to shade the plants of clover and manure its roots, which in turn manure the corn or wheat.

As a source of profit alone, we should recommend the continuous application of Guano; knowing as we do, from our extensive means of observation, that no outlay of capital ever made by the farmer, is so sure and certain to bring him back good returns for his money, as when he invests it in this invaluable fertilizer for his impoverished soil. In proof of this, we shall give the reader of this little work a number of experiments made by some of the most improving farmers in Virginia and other States.

EFFECTS PRODUCED BY THE USE OF GUANO IN VIRGINIA.

In no other part of the world, perhaps, can the beneficial effects of Guano be more plainly seen than in the tide-water region of Virginia. In the counties of King George, Westmoreland, Richmond, Northumberland, Lancaster, in the northern neck, as the peninsula between the Potomac and Rappahanock is termed; thousands of acres of land so poor and worthless a few years ago, it was barely rated as property, are now annually producing beautiful crops of wheat, corn and clover, solely by the application of Guano. In the meantime, the discovery of such an easy means of improving a worn out and barren soil, has increased the money value of land three or four hundred per cent. This is not all. Heretofore, the only part of this district considered worth cultivation was the bottom land bordering the rivers and creeks; the forest land yielding scanty crops for two or three years after being cleared, scarcely paying for the labor, while its value was rated at from $1 to $4 per acre, and unsaleable at that. Since the introduction of Guano, it is found these forest lands, which are of a sandy, loamy character, and much more pleasant than the bottom lands to till, can be cultivated with equal or greater profit than the stiff lands upon the bottoms. The writer has seen repeatedly in the counties mentioned, luxuriant fields of wheat, corn and clover, while directly alongside of such crops, the ground was almost as bare of vegetation as the sea-shore sands, too poor, as the common expression is there, to bear poverty grass. And what produced this change? Simply a dressing of 200 lbs. of Guano to the acre.

DR. FAIRFAX'S EXPERIMENTS WITH GUANO.

In April 1850 the writer was on the farm of Dr. Fairfax of King George county, who was one of the first, if not quite the first person in that part of the State who ever made use of this substance as a manure; and his wheat was then so large that a good sized dog was hidden from view in running through the field; while upon a neighboring piece of land of exactly the same quality, sowed at the same time, the ground scarcely looked green; in fact, it was remarked at the time by way of contrast to the one field hiding a dog, that the other would not hide a chicken--indeed, an egg might have been seen as far as though no wheat was growing upon the ground. Both fields were just alike, both plowed and sowed alike, without manure, except 200 lbs of Peruvian guano upon one, and that sure to bring fifteen or twenty bushels to the acre, while the other would not exceed three bushels.

One of his first trials was with the African, of which he applied 400 lbs. to the acre upon 27 acres, which would not produce three bushels of wheat to the acre, in its natural condition, but with this application, notwithstanding it was 32 per cent. water, and, consequently, had lost much of it ammonia, he made an average of 12-3/4 bushels to the acre on the whole field. Upon another, he increased the usual average yield from 8 to 18 bushels, while, in his opinion, the permanent improvement of the land was of greater value than the increased yield of the first crop; for now clover will grow where none would grow before; another advantage arising from guano is, the wheat ripens so much earlier (15th of June) it escapes the rust, so apt to blight that which is late coming to maturity. He now sows wheat in the fore part of September, three pecks to the acre, after having previously plowed in 200 lbs. of Peruvian guano to the acre, and after the first harrowing sows the clover seed. The land is a yellow clay loam, uneven surface, very much worn; in fact, without the guano, and with all the manure that could be made upon the farm--for no straw no manure--not worth cultivating. Dr. F. had been using guano three years, at the date of our visit, and thought his prospect good for a thousand bushels of wheat upon the same ground, which, without guano would not produce one hundred and fifty.

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