permaculture

["Jerome Osentowski" <jerome@crmpi.org>]

Regarding strawbale greenhouses:  I have been growing in and constuling on
greenhouse construction for the last fifteen years,  I also work with John
Cruichshank, sunyjohn.com and hobbithouse@compuserve.com  Strawbales might
be ok for a simple greenhouse structure that you do not put a lot of $'s and
time into, and if it doesn't work you won't be out much.  The main problem
with straw is the potential of the bales getting wet or taking up all the
moisture that is in the greenhouse.  The second problem with bales is that
they are only good for insulation and do not help add thremo mass.   Just
because it is a good material for building your house doesn't mean it will
work on greenhouse.  You need to check it out against the pc principles.
Let me remind you  about some other ideas that did not work out in the past.
Chicken  and compost in greenhouse both turned out to be , not such a good
idea,  both creating toxic air and gas.  But when the idea first came out,
many rushed to try it out, only to scrap the system later.

The Water for heating is another hair brain idea.   Why bother with all the
pipeing any plumbing , and heating water to pipe into the soil to heat the
greenhouse, when you have all that free hot moist air in the greenhouse
every day.  We have been working with a system that blows this hot air
through the soil with 4" ADS flexible pipes .  This system preforms four
functions. it heats the soil. takes the moisture out of the air, ie. there
is a faze change when the moist air contacts the cool pipes,  It alo
circulates the air, also cools the green house during the day, at the same
time it is heating the soil.   At night a different thermostat turns on the
same small
fan to discharge the soil and put 60 deg air into the greenhouse.  This is
your back up  system.  I also add a wood sauna for a second back up .    If
you do something , see how many functions it will preform.  John C.  has
this system on his web site.  we will have it up on ours soon. Our latest
design was down in  Durango on a 80 foot house.  there should be photos up
on that project.  I have just redesigned my 60 foot house that is now a
indoor
forest garden for med. and worm temperate and some tropical plants.  The
same heating system that i insstalled 15 years ago still works.  We got
through one night of 0 deg  with the help of a sauna last week.

With the forest garden model and adding lots of flowering plants , mostly
umbols. we create habatat for benifical insects.  We have been growing in
these greenhouses with no major outbrakes of pest insects for 15 years.
A few years ago Mr. Coleman came to see how we were able to grow yeararound
without major insects problems.  He went home and put his greenhouse on a
track,  so he could freeze out the ground. on alternate years.  That system
might not work so good here in the Rocky's unless you wanted to use your
greenhouse as a houseboat in lake powell for the winter.  I have two fennel
plants in one greenhouse that have been there for 15 years.  ,  they do most
of the hosting and IPM for the benificials and also host the wasp that
polenates the fig trees. We also never add compost,because we just add
leaves  or mulch at different times of the year, and let the worms do the
work.  Does that sound too easy? We also use comfery and manure teas during
the gorwing season.  If you can improve on that system ,  be my gest.
Jerome


--
Jerome Osentowski, Director
Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture Institute
PO Box 631
Basalt, CO 81621   U.S.A.

Tel/fax (970) 927-4158    E mail: jerome@crmpi.org

For more information, please visit our web site at <<www.crmpi.org>>


----------
>From: "Ingvald Erga" <ergagard@world-online.no>
>To: <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
>Subject: Re: [permaculture] corn burning and straw building
>Date: Mon, Nov 18, 2002, 2:44 AM
>

> About the question on strawbales in greenhouse. I copi a mail I have recived
> from Cananda about the subject. By the way about my name Ingvald, I am a he.
>
> Ingvald Erga
> Norway
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Lynn Oliphant" <LYNN.OLIPHANT@usask.ca>
> To: <ergagard@world-online.no>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 26, 2000 7:23 PM
> Subject: Hello!
>
>
>>     Dear Ingvald,
>>     My wife Rhonda and I have just returned home after a month-long trip
>> down into the U.S.  We were pleasantly surprised to find your
>> informative fax regarding your farm and inquiry about our low-input
>> greenhouses.  We have been following the advice of Eliot Coleman in his
>> book "Four-Season Harvest" and adding our experience with strawbale
>> construction as we live in a very cold climate with winter temperatures
>> that often go to minus 40 or lower.
>>     We built a strawbale house with a buried strawbale perimeter
>> insulation "foundation" and a strawbale roof as well as walls.  We live
>> on a rolling piece of land that is now primarily in native vegetation;
>> two thirds had never been cultivated and the other third we planted back
>> to native grass.  We are attempting to follow permaculture principles
>> and heat the house with a radiant floor system driven by solar hot water
>> panels and a water jacket on our soapstone wood stove.  The house was
>> designed to make use of passive solar energy as well as we have lots of
>> sun.  We have a composting toilet and a rain water collection system
>> from our roof.
>>     Our experiments with low-input greenhouse vegetable production have
>> been very promising.  Our basic design now is a simple hoop or quonset
>> style made with 1 or 11/2 inch 20foot PVC pipe inserted onto small
>> lengths of scrap pipe or rebar pounded into the ground 12 feet apart.
>> Superstrong woven poly covers the hoops and is attached to 2x4 inch
>> baseboards and end frames.  This extends our growing season by about a
>> month at each end and more importantly protects our warm season crops
>> from the wind.  We are now experimenting with the placement of cold
>> frames within the greenhouse to allow for the harvesting of vegetables
>> nearly year round as described in Coleman's book.
>>     We have also built greenhouses using strawbale walls.  We feel that
>> the ultimate greenhouse for our part of the world would have a strawbale
>> north wall and partial roof with double glazing on the south faces with
>> radiant heating of the soil using hot water (actually glycol) solar
>> panels to provide the heat.
>>     We have formed a local group we call the Prairie Institute for Human
>> Ecology that is primarily involved in education and building
>> demonstration projects.  It is wonderful to know that similar efforts
>> are being made in many areas of the world.  Our current vision is to
>> start work on an eco-village that would have a learning center as well
>> as a group of dedicated people living on site.
>>     I hope you and your family are having a good holiday!  Lynn Oliphant
>>
>>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Kelly Finigan" <kfinigan@telus.net>
> To: <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Monday, November 18, 2002 7:48 AM
> Subject: Re: [permaculture] corn burning and straw building
>
>
>> Meg:
>>
>> pigs can tear a building apart.. a pig farmer around here built a
> strawbale
>> barn with stucco. The pigs tend to "root" about with their snouts and
>> demolished the stucco. Another pig farmer friend thinks a knee-high
> concrete
>> wall inside would prevent the pigs from damaging the stucco. I don't know
>> about the other animals, but my gut feel is a greenhouse with high
> humidity
>> might begin to rot if made from strawbales...maybe somebody has seen a
> straw
>> greenhouse?
>>
>> cheers,
>> Kelly
>>
>> Kelly Finigan, M.Sc. P.Eng., Permaculture Designer
>> Essential Elements Inc.
>> 744 - 4 Street NW       Calgary, Alberta, Canada         T2N 1P2
>> 1-403-283-7270           fax 283-9783     kfinigan@telus.net
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Meg Mullett" <meg@kcnet.com>
>> To: <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
>> Sent: Sunday, November 17, 2002 8:13 AM
>> Subject: [permaculture] corn burning and straw building
>>
>>
>> > Hello,
>> >
>> > My family and I moved to our little farm in NE Kansas 2 years ago.
> We've
>> got
>> > 12.5 acres, a little 70 yr old house, 1 acre of vineyard, a small
> orchard,
>> a
>> > little woods and several acres of pasture.  We spent the first year
> mostly
>> just
>> > seeing what's here and putting in our vineyard. (I'm a winemaker)  The
>> second we
>> > started a large garden and got a couple pigs.  This coming year we wish
> to
>> fence
>> > more and add some more animals.  We're thinking about chickens (a few
> for
>> eggs),
>> > guinea hens (for bugs in the vineyard) and some meat goats (helping to
>> clear
>> > some brushy areas and for cash - we've got large hispanic and muslim
>> populations
>> > in Kansas City and we believe we've got a good market for them).
>> >
>> > As we grow our little farm each year, we are wishing to tread more
> lightly
>> on
>> > the planet.  And with a "dance with the one that brung ya" sort of
>> attitude, we
>> > are looking to use resources that are plentiful in our area. We are
>> thinking
>> > about building our animal shelters out of straw bale, and installing a
>> corn
>> > burning stove in the house for winter heat. We're using propane right
> now.
>> >
>> > I am wondering if any of you might share some of your experiences with
>> either of
>> > these things.  Have you used straw bales for animal enclosures?  Are
> there
>> any
>> > special considerations we should be taking or thinking about when doing
>> this?
>> > How do straw bale buildings hold up as animal enclosures?  Can they take
> a
>> > beating by goat heads?  Might pigs leaning on them and scratching every
>> day
>> > cause some problems?   Do some animals like to eat the stucco/plaster?
>> What
>> > kind of measures might be required if you wanted to create a fairly high
>> > humidity enclosure, - like a greenhouse, or a chicken coop?   What about
>> > moveable enclosures on skids?  Would the weight of such a building be
> too
>> great
>> > to move about as you pasture the animals?  Do you think straw bale would
>> work
>> > for those sort of things?
>> >
>> > How about corn stoves?  Have any of you used one?  Do they really work
> as
>> well
>> > as advertised?  For those that aren't sure about what there are, here
> are
>> a few
>> > links:
>> >
>> > http://www.agriculture.com/buyersguide/sidebyside/sbs_cornstove.html
>> > http://news.mpr.org/features/200101/31_galballye_cornstove-m/
>> >
>> >
>> > I look forward to your thoughts.  Any tips or advice you might send
> would
>> be
>> > greatly appreciated.
>> >
>> > Meg
>> > Spring Hill, KS
>> >
>> >
>> >
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