MSS. intended for publication and books, etc., intended for review should be sent to The Editor of Science, Garrison-onHudson, N. Y.

AN ILLUSTRATION OF PRA RESULTS FROM THE PROTE

OF NATURAL RESORUCI ABOUT fifteen years ago a highl ened administration of the gover Peru became interested in the decli country's valuable guano industry a parent diminution in number of g ducing birds. It was the privileg writer to be engaged by the Peruvia ment for an investigation of the co the guano industry and the possibili preservation, as well as for studie to the fisheries and to the marine 1 flora. On my arrival in Lima I pressed with the alert attitude of g officials in reference to the guano ind with their anxiety to take whatever might, as the result of careful inv be found conducive to the conservat guano birds. A most significant p step had indeed already been take the closure of the three Chincha After an extended investigation, & recommendations for the general of the guano industry was submit Director de Fomento, and, with hi the report was reproduced in SCIEN 10, 1908. A few excerpts from 1 will be illustrative.

2. The present tendency to decrease (of birds) may be checked. There is reliable testimony from the older men perience in the industry, that the usef were formerly vastly more abundan .. If they have endured the treatme received without decrease in numbe

1 Two of the islands were shortly guano extraction under pressure of c but the South Island remained cl three breeding seasons, affording demonstration of the utility of the m "Habits and Economic Relations ( Birds of Peru," Proc. U. S. N. M., V

tection can hardly be worth while. On the other hand, if it is true, as represented by every one who should know, that there has been a great diminution in number of birds, then

3. We may hope that the protection of the birds will result in a great increase in their numbers. Before the working for guano on a large scale began and before the nesting grounds began to be plundered for eggs and fowls, the birds must have existed in a condition of abundance dependent upon their food supply, their enemies and their natural prolificness. New factors have entered in recent years which have caused the birds to decrease materially below this normal condition of abundance. If these unfavorable factors are removed by well-considered and well-executed protective measures, why may we not see an increase in number toward the former normal abundance?

I think it conservative to say that the proper protection of the birds means the saving to Peru of hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of guano each year. . . .

...

We... may well plan for protective measures that are intended to work progressively to the advantage of the industry for the next twenty years or more. We want to see many more birds in 1915 than are present in 1908, and more birds in 1920 than in 1915; and this will not be accomplished by routing the birds from their nesting grounds as soon as they are fairly established.

The general plan of protection comprised the following essential elements.

1. The admission of but a single concessionist to an island or a group of islands in order to eliminate the vigorous competition which was resulting in utter disregard of the needs of the birds, requiring also that the concessionist, through a resident representative on each island, should be held responsible for the fullest protection of the birds.

2. The closing of islands for periods of years.

tion between the ex which a considerable was mortgaged) and might be obviated.

The problem before th agriculture, and the ex How can the guano ind ture? Certainly no le furthered by a continua: factory system, with its I think the solution furthered if we put the q system of regulation w annual deposit of guano

It was a comparative recommendations, but one to give them effect tions arising from the dition of the guano de of the current deposits agriculture, and the r tions which culminate recommendations were serious revolutionary 1 many years. The matt of the guano industry track of altogether, and several of the measures effect at an early date. took up the matter ag and enlisted the servic Forbes of England who of the conditions and hensive report to the As this report has not not, unfortunately, be ci It is evident that the pr in effect are based upo ciples outlined above. guano for national agri the hands of a single o

closed season of months.

4. Placing the extraction of guano for national agriculture in the hands of a single company, which would thus "be induced to plan for the future."

5. Adjustment with the Peruvian Corporation, Limited, whereby detrimental competi

responsible to and regu ment. Suitable adjustm the Peruvian Corporati season was continued, islands for periods of ye lished part of the plan o ians were put upon the s

g corporation (to ion of the guano national company

nment, the national company, is this: e saved to the fu e interest ean be he present unsatis of the birds. problem will be in this way: What ; in the greatest years henee! matter to offer

remely difficult
se of complica-
nortgaged con
he inadequacy
ise of national
aternal condi
cly after the

, in the most
ts known in
preservation
however, lost
derstood that
were given
government
Serious way
Tessor S. 0.
reful study
a compre-
overnment.
hed it can
connection.
sures now

tial prin

action of
placed in
The Com-
directly
govern-
ade with
e closed

sing of
n estab-

Guard

As to the results, we have convincing testimony from Dr. Robert Cushman Murphy, of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, who has recently visited Peru and given especial attention to the birds of the guano islands. Some of his observations are comprised in a series of papers of fascinating interest entitled "The Sea Coast and Islands of Peru" appearing in current numbers of the Brooklyn Museum Quarterly. I quote from the last number (October, 1920, p. 250).

The first undertaking of the Compañia Administradora del Guano under the able directorship of Senor Francisco Ballen, was to make each of the numerous guano islands a bird sanctuary, closed at all seasons of the year to unauthorized visitors. Competent guardians with duties scarcely less exacting than those of lighthouse keepers, were posted as permanent residents upon every group. Clandestine guano extraction, the stealing of birds' eggs for food or for the use of the albumin in clearing wine, and other disturbances which had formerly caused havoc in the colonies, ceased at once. The old method of extracting guano without regard to the presence or physiological condition of the birds has, of course, been abolished, the islands, under the new rule, being worked according to a system of rotation which leaves ample and congenial breeding grounds always available. Courting or nesting birds are now carefully shielded from disturbance.

More

over, after removal of the guano, an island is promptly vacated and is thereafter given over to the complete possession of the birds for a period of approximately thirty months, at the expiration of which the date for a renewal of digging operations is determined only after careful reconnais

sance.

The régime of the Compañia Administradora del Guano, with its well-balanced regard for both business and conservation, has resulted in a nearly uniform increase in the annual increment of guano, as well as a promising outlook for a continually augmenting supply while the birds are repopulating the breeding grounds to the limits imposed by space and the nutritive resources of the littoral ocean. Since 1910, the administration has issued an annual "Memoria" containing statistical data, from which the following table of production has been taken:

The slight fluctuations in the column less due to the fact that no island is v years in succession, which results in a disproportionately large yield for the which the product of the most important included. In a letter dated August 24, 1 Ballen writes that the guano output fo rent year will exceed 82,000 tons, of wh tons will be required by native agricul 12,000 tons will be at the disposal of th Corporation for export. It should be that the tabulated figures refer to newly guano, for the so-called "fossil" beds long since exhausted except upon Lobos and Lobos de Afuera.

Most instructive deductions may from the table of guano produc quoted. In the first place, it is evi in the early years of the period co annual production of guano was mately as estimated in 1908, i.e., fi 25,000 tons per annum. In the sec it appears that, beginning about annual production of guano (propo large measure to the abundance of birds) has risen to more than 80,00 the present time. The production 1 proximately three times as much ten years ago. In 1908 the annua were far below the estimated requi national agriculture, disregarding requirement. In 1920 the productio tially exceeds a greatly increased re for national agriculture so that a export may be carried on even with fice of internal requirements. Th ment derives revenue of more than dollars a year from the extraction a reasonable profit accures to the Administradora, and presumably to