Guano

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30316, 17 December 1963, Page 3

Guano

Sir.—South Africa is interested in the guano island. Juan de Nova, off Madagascar. the world’s greatest phosphate fertiliser deposit. When in Peru, the writer saw guano birds over the Humboldt current Once we travelled for hours parallel to a black ribbon of cormorants. other guano birds. They were feeding on the Humboldt current’s anchovies. The writer's grandfather was one of von Humboldt's young students. He had the rare faculty of getting coming scientists to pledge their lives to overseas research. He assigned Grandad to Mexico. This became his dominant life aim. He is buried in Mexico City. Von Humboldt, returning to Europe, preached “Peru guano can save from starvation overpopulated Europe." Ships soon rounded the Horn in fabulously profitable commerce. Deposits approached exhaustion. Birds were ruthlessly slaughtered. Then a Peruvian scientist of vision forced the enactment of conservation legislation. Now guano birds have come back. Peru’s taxpayers again find burden lightened because our overpopulated world needs fertiliser.—Yours, etc., C. M. GOETHE. Sacramento. California, December 14, 1963.