Re: SB: Re: SB and a Better Mouse Trap

[John Salmen <terrain@shaw.ca>]

I like that comment from Habib as well. I often think clients don't get well
enough informed in an alternative building process and that people involved
in alternative building have to view their involvement as a committment that
goes beyond day to day business.

The talk about Fukuoka make me think of a comment that wes jackson made that
the best of amish farm practices still resulted in more loss of soil than
the worst of prairie grazing. In other words that our efforts at doing
better, differently, alternatively still are not as progressive as simply
doing less, with less.

Living in the land of trees I have to concur that a little wooden clapboard
can make sense. I encourage the use of trees locally right now as it keeps
some forests alive that might otherwise not be in this time - a perverted
kind of logic but an acre of forest has more planetary value than an acre of
some crop. Here I will get a little personal and flaky though and say that
stick framing is a bit of an obscenity that has no respect for the tree. At
least in timber structures you get to appreciate more the growth and
character of the wood and get forced to form some relationship to it - and
develop some empathy with the forest. Empathy and conservation somehow go
together.

  Stick framing though has been a kind of social empowerement in north
america. Anyone with a cheap skil saw and a weekend can go to the home
despot and knock something up or add something on. In some places the same
inspiration would take a year of permits, variances, negotiations with
tradespeople and be a 1/8" of the size. Personally I like the latter as most
people would look at the difficulties involved and either lose the
inspiration or end up with something that was needed to begin with.

As to Fukuoka and tractors. I remember reading about some developer
industrialist during the depression who went to a building site and looked
at a new excavator the foreman was showing off. The foreman said it was a
marvel and could do the work of a hundred men. The guy said something to the
affect of 'get rid of it and hire me a hundred men'.  I'm not sure what the
point of that anecdote is as I'm sure the hundred men would rather watch the
excavator do the grunt work if they weren't so desperate for work. My own
gardening efforts though are inspired by Fukuoka if for no other reason than
laziness . But then we barely feed ourselves much less the world.

hope you don't mind the ramble.

john


----- Original Message -----
From: "Athena and Bill Steen" <absteen@dakotacom.net>
To: "Huff 'n' Puff Constructions" <huffnpuff@shoal.net.au>;
<strawbale@crest.org>
Sent: Monday, March 25, 2002 5:28 AM
Subject: Re: SB: Re: SB and a Better Mouse Trap


> Since we were mentioned further down in this commentary of the Asthmatic
> Wolf, I thought I ought to reply, especially since it included mention to
> Fukuoka who I have long admired.  Anyhow, John G's comments made me think
a
> little.  I think experimentation is a big part of what straw bale is
about,
> however, I really liked Habib's post where he threw in the comments from
Bob
> Platts that said something like we don't charge our clients for our
> experiments.  But going back to Fukuoka, the thing that I think so many
> people have missed over the years is that his solution was truly local.
The
> few people who tried to replicate it over the years often tried to export
> his model without realizing that they had to do the same thing in a way
that
> it was appropriate to where they lived.
>
> I think it is the same with building, especially straw bales.  In our
> efforts to evolve different ways of building, I think the methods we use
> really have to be locally based (materials and skills) to be ultimately
> credible and viable in the long term.  For example, with all the effort
> going into wood reduction these days, I always have to ask myself whether
or
> not it is the use of wood that needs to be cut back or the export and
> selling of it to all sorts of places that don't have any or little.  I
> realize these comments are stepping on the toes of practicality, but what
> the h*(&.  I mean when I am sitting here in the early morning thinking of
> all those Canadians up there surrounded by trees (except those out there
in
> the freezing plains), it seems that the sensible thing ought to be for
them
> to use a little more wood than us down here in Arizona.  Perhaps a little
> wood clapboard use instead of relying on cement and wire.  Don't know, but
> they are interesting questions.  And since I don't live there I don't know
> if I can even begin thinking about it intelligently.
>
> And yes I think we ought to be involved in a constant effort to simplify
the
> way we do things.  Things get faster, more efficient, but when one stops
to
> look around at the results, one obviously has to ask just where is it that
> we are going.  I had a great conversation with a commercial painter the
> other day that most enjoyable and insightful.  He lamented how all sense
of
> craft was gone from his work and how in general the whole industry did
> crappy work.  He went on to mention that the only way he could profit
these
> days was to grab the brief window between those applying the stucco and
> those taking down the scaffolding.  I'll leave the implications alone for
> now.
>
> So I think that is enough philosophy for the moment, but I will let John G
> know that Fukuoka worked his butt off compared to tractor driven methods
and
> that in the end, his farm stands abandoned and no one that I know of
really
> was able to emulate his methods successfully.
>
> B...
>



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