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Aren't there a lot of stucco structures where you live 
Bob? Our old house is made of D'Hanis block, which is sort 
of big and hollow like a concrete block only made of clay 
from a nearby brick foundry, then stuccoed. It's not made 
anymore, but was a cool product. My previous house was 
pure lath and plaster, so I'm used to it. Of course these 
are lime plasters. However, on the strawbales I helped 
build we used earth plasters on the inside and because of 
the rainfall around Austin, we used lime plasters on the 
outside.

I was one of the ten people that started the Strawbale 
Association of Texas, which has since merged with the 
Sustainable Building Coalition. Some of the members wrote 
and passed a strawbale building code for Austin. I got to 
work alongside David Isenburg on the first house, and 
became a 'straw boss' on the next two, meaning I headed 
the team that built one side of each house. My friend 
Marcia to this day says it's the only side of her house 
that's straight! I also helped a friend build a geodesic 
dome (the math is crazy). I love to design and build stuff 
and have most of the tools. I get this from my father who 
gave me a hammer, nails, and blocks of wood when most kids 
were just stacking blocks.

There was a guy from the Strawbale group that built a 
strawbale duplex. Not long after it was finished it was 
hit by a tornado while he was home. It was destroyed, 
however, beacuse of all the cattle pannels, wire ties, and 
rebar used in the support system, it collapsed on him very 
slowly and he was able to get out alive. He attributes it 
to saving his life, and said if he'd  been in stick frame 
construction he would have been dead.

Anyway, I like that straw is very lightweight that almost 
anyone can lift it, and children can help sweep up the 
loose bits. There's something to do for anyone wanting to 
be involved. It goes up relatively quickly and you can 
live in it while you are still plastering. There's a guy 
in the hill country that converted a machine that sprays 
gunnite to be able to throw earth plaster instead. He is 
usually hired to do the first coat that must really stick 
to the straw. Lots of unskilled folks then smooth it out, 
and then as subsequent coats go on by hand the more 
skilled folks work on that. Often times professional 
plasterers are hired for the finish coat if the owner 
wants that kind of perfection.

--Sage

On Sun, 12 Oct 2008 11:01:46 -0700 (PDT)
 bob ford <bobford79 AT yahoo.com> wrote:
> That's interesting Sage.  I knew you were a plant 
> person; I didn't know you were a builder.
>
> I was interested in the personal side of the story, 
> also.  I'm glad those women were able to find acceptance 
> in their community, I've seen them on tv or a video 
> somewhere.  I think they have actually started making a 
> few friends.  
>
> I like earthbag construction.  My fear is that if the 
> engineering isn't perfect, you could have a collapse of a 
> wall so heavy, the accident would surely be fatal.  There 
> was a real important man in alternative green and 
> sustainable building, who died when one of his houses 
> fell in.  I don't remember his name, I had several of his 
> books.  Gene probably knows of whom I'm speaking.
>
>
> I've seen strawbale out here.  I'm not fond of stucco, 
> but in most natural source walls, there isn't much 
> alternative .....bobford