The Rural Voice, 2006-04, Page 31(AumAR)
placement and the plastering, the area
experienced one of the worst storms
of the summer, with a tornado
touching down not far from the
house. Torrential rain soaked one
corner of the house, but with extra
bales set aside "just in case", the
affected area was easily replaced.
The next part of the process took
several weeks. First the mesh had to
be "sewn" to the bales. Gaps were
stuffed with straw, and giant needles
were used to pull baling twine
through the bales, which was tied to
the mesh and pulled tight to snake
sure it hugged the walls as closely as
possible.
Some of the workers were
horrified when the plastering crew
started hosing down the walls, but it
not only aided in getting the concrete
to adhere to the straw, but the water
was quickly drawn out of the straw
by the concrete as it cured. In fact the
whole house had to be watered
several times a day for a week to aid
in curing and to minimize cracking.
The plastering crew applied two
coats of concrete to the two-
storey, 2900 -square -foot house
in four and a half days. The crew was
headed up by Peter Mack and Tina
Therrien of Camel's Back
Construction. Experts in the field of
straw bale construction. they travel
all over the province every summer
just plastering homes.
In 2000, Peter, along with Chris
Magwood (the other partner in
Camel's Back), authored the first
definitive (but now out of print)
Canadian book on straw bale
technology. More recently. Tina
joined the writing team to create
More Straw Bale Building: How to
plan, design & build with straw
(New Society Publishers 2005).
Chris has taken it of lead
instructor of tir .., .. Design
and Construction course at Sir
Sandford Fleming College in
Haliburton, and is a tireless
innovator; always pushing the
envelope to see what other materials
and methods can improve the end
product.
Now, it might be easy to think of
straw bales as little more than an
architectural fad. The reasons given
for building with straw run from the
aesthetic to the practical, from the
political to the economical, and it all
sounds like a lot of talk. But once
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APRIL 2006 27