Guano
GUANO
GUANO, nitrate-rich bat dung that is an excellent fertilizer, was first imported into the United States in 1824 by John S. Skinner, a proponent of progressive agriculture and the editor of the first U.S. farm journal, American Farmer. The agricultural press, picking up on progressive farming techniques that made use of various fertilizers (composed of bones, seaweed, rock phosphate, night soil, or various manures) to boost production, began to focus attention on the value of guano as an almost magical fertilizer. Its advocates urged farmers to try it, regaling them with fabulous stories of its productive power, but its use was insignificant until the 1840s and never spread far beyond the relatively small, if influential, group of progressive farmers. Its high price, owing in part to a Peruvian monopoly of the principal source, led to declining use after 1854.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Mathew, W. M. The House of Gibbs and the Peruvian Guano Monopoly. London: Royal Historical Society, 1981.
Skaggs, Jimmy. The Great Guano Rush. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994.
FredCole/c. w.
See alsoAgriculture ; Fertilizers .