[GSBN] Suitablity of fresh cowdung supplies from feedlots for natural plasters

[Derek Roff]

Cow dung gives you marvelous and complex chemistry that would be hard 
to duplicate.  It also gives you a certain amount of short, 
well-processed fiber, that can be matched, and perhaps improved upon, 
by fiber from a number of sources.  Horse manure, chopped straw, and 
animal hair are among the fiber sources that I think add more control 
and adjustability to a plaster mix than the fiber that you get from 
cow manure.  My teachers have all tended to use cow manure plus other 
fiber sources, regardless of the feedlot question.

The feedlot diet will probably affect the chemistry side of the 
equation, too, especially if they use antibiotics.  But since Herbert 
has made feedlot manure work in your area, that's a good 
recommendation for you.  I think you will be able to add other fiber 
sources to make up for any deficiencies on the fiber side of the 
equation.

Derelict

Derek Roff
Language Learning Center
Ortega Hall 129, MSC03-2100
University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131-0001
505/277-7368, fax 505/277-3885
Internet: derek at unm.edu


--On Tuesday, April 19, 2011 3:12 PM +0200 Andy Horn 
<andy at ecodesignarchitects.co.za> wrote:

Hi all

I am busy with 3 large straw bale public building, coating in a thick 
dipping of earth plaster and well worked in to the bales, which we 
are protecting with 2 top coats of lime, sand, cow dung and clay 
water plaster using a recipe I learnt from an old builder Herbert 
whom was taught it by his grandfather for the plastering of the adobe 
buildings of his old Moravian mission town.

We are having a bit of difficulty getting sufficient supplies of 
fresh cow dung near our site in Johannesburg, however we have located 
a nearby feedlot, where the stuff is readily available only thing is 
that I are wondering if this kind of cow dung would still be suitable 
....as I imagine it would have less fibre than cow dung sourced from 
free ranging cattle. Apparently the cows at the feeding station are 
fed on about 10% hay/grass and 90% grain.

What Herbert our old heritage builder tells us is that it should be 
fine so long as they are fed some fibre and that indeed he has made 
use of such cow dung before and one cannot even tell the difference. 
For him the more important thing is that the cow dung is fresh 
...i.e. no more than 3 days old.

So anyhow I was wondering if any of you lot out there have any with 
experience in using feed-lot cow dung for their plasters and if you 
have come up against similar issues in terms of what the cows get to 
eat affecting the quality of the cow dung before and if you have any 
opinions/experience with this.

Incidentally the plaster mix that we get with this receipt is 
particularly good. It is both very strong and extremely durable as 
well as being particularly forgiving and really easy to work with as 
lime plasters typically go.

So if any of you are interested I could email you a pdf document 
directly ( please respond to me separately on 
andy at ecodesignarchitects.co.za ....do not reply to the whole mailing 
group) that I have written up on the process...as I am not sure I can 
mail it to this address direct....unless you want me upload it 
somewhere. Joyce I would be more than  happy for you to print it up 
in a forthcoming "Last Straw" magazine too.

cheers

Andy