Ah, she's brilliant. Miss, I finally got plans out the group chat. We get it. Four votes for a festival,

three for a city break. It's hard to adhere to everyone's needs. There's Betty with her oversized

tent. Sarah and her six foot eight boyfriend.

All right.

Roger Junior and his dog, Roger Senior.

And don't get us started on Mel.

But, like a marriage counselor, she's the one keeping things together.

All aboard Miss I finally got plans out the group chat. Keep everyone's plans alive when you

travel with us. P, Stephen Moss, his new book,

Ten Birds that Change the World, Peru.

The Comerant, the Comerant's droppings turn into Guano. And this story is so strange

I go immediately to Stephen Moss to help me tell it. The discovery of the guano on these islands, the arid islands

50 meters deep. I put that all together with who did who had the breakthrough when did they have the

breakthrough that it was fertilizer Stephen well actually the Incas so over a

thousand years ago the Inca civilization in South America,

knew about Guana. Guana is very like Orsi, but who basically droppings, it is very rich in phosphates and nitrates and it's very very good fertilizer.

But of course that had been forgotten with the end of the Inca civilization.

And then in the 19th century a British businessman called William Gibbs based near where I live actually in Bristol

He and his partners went over to Peru and harvested this guano.

Now the important thing here is that you mention the fact that it's very arid islands.

Seabha's living colonies around the world, they live off North America, they live off Europe in colonies, but it rains in those places and so the guano washes away.

There's some left, but broadly it washes away. That didn't happen.

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