[Cob] living tree question

[Dirtcheapbuilder-Charmaine Taylor]

  I concur, my Redwood framed house from 1949 had a sunrron addition 
added in 1982.

  they placed the support posts ontop of the existing 800 year old 
redwood tree stump ( it was massive... covered 1/3 of the underpart of 
the house!!)

In any case, after 20 years the redwood stump, which is softwood after 
all, rotted away and most of the  room support posts were hanging in 
mid air over the stump!!    So the first 9 months of my  new home 
ownership was spent  removing the  massive stump in parts, and putting 
in footings and posts so the sunroom  would not sink!

the GOOD part is the bits and pieces of the ancient stump were turned 
into  pottery  & plant base holders, and  short pointy root art all 
around the property.  so I got to keep, and honor, the life of the old 
redwood tree.  It is hard to image trees so large you can walk inside 
them until you come to Humboldt and see how big they are.  I have two 
more on my property that big!


Charmaine



On Dec 12, 2006, at 8:58 PM, Leslie Moyer wrote:

I don't remember which book, but I read a natural building book with a 
story
about someone who did this and the short version is that all the stumps
rotted very quickly and compromised the integrity of his structure 
within
just a couple of years.  Wish I could point you to the source, but I 
just
don't recall.

--Leslie

On 12/12/06, jimmy carlisle <nascarsix66 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Okay, this may be way out there, I can't find anything close to it
> anywhere on the net, so this is a good place to ask it.  I have a area 
> I
> want to build a cob home.  I also have a few very tall trees I don't 
> want to
> cut and have to try and get the stumps out.  What would happen if I 
> cut the
> trees about 8 ft. high, cut them even, and use them as corner posts 
> for the
> roof?  Is this a very bad plan?  I thought of debarking them and 
> puttting a
> coat of varnish on also.
>    Are they going to keep growning after I do this?  I thought it would
> look good and blend in well.
>     I welcome all comments...
>
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