The Guano Wars: How The World Almost Went To Blows Over Crap
You can polish a turd
There are various times in the world’s history when it’s lost its collective mind over a certain odd material.
The Ancient Romans paid incredible fees for the smelly purple dye produced by dead mollusks. In the age of imperialism, it was spices which tempted sailors to travel the globe.
In the Dutch Golden Age there was a craze over tulip bulbs. However, in the mid to late 1800’s there was a craze that topped them all.
A nondescript set of islands sits off the coast of Peru, which most would likely ignore. In fact, the only real residents on the Chincha Islands were birds: cormorants, boobies, and pelicans.
A population of 60 million of them were drawn here because there was an ample supply of fish and no predators. It was a literal bird paradise.
Unfortunately, in a bird’s paradise they let fly wherever they feel like and the islands accumulated thousands of years’ worth of excrement. Little rain also meant it rarely washed away.
