Straw Bale House on the Prairie

Image Gallery “The Hybrid House” showcases real people who have used a combination of design strategies to reduce their home energy use — sometimes by as much as 90 percent! COVER: GIBBS SMITH

The following is an excerpt from The Hybrid House by Catherine Wanek (Gibbs Smith, 2010). With eye-catching photography, Wanek illustrates how reducing home energy consumption can be cost-effective, healthful and luxurious as she profiles 12 inspiring, contemporary homes from diverse climates across the United States, Canada and Europe. This excerpt is from Chapter 6, “Midwest.” 

Location: The Flint Hills of Southeast Kansas
Owner: Jane Koger
Architect: Stephen Lane, Lawrence, Kan.
Builder: Jerry Keller
Interior finishes: Jann Jaggard
Year built: 2000
Square footage: 1,600
Climate: Hot, humid summers, cold winters, windy year-round
Site specifics: Rolling grassland, 32 inches of average annual rainfall
Bedrooms/baths: 2 bedrooms/1 bath, plus loft bedroom
Approximate cost: Not available
Sustainable strategies: Salvaged lumber and limestone from an old barn used for structure, trim, floors and stone walls. Native Indiangrass from the land was baled for the wall insulation. A 2-kilowatt photovoltaic (PV) solar system and a 1-kilowatt wind generator provide electricity. Fifteen solar thermal panels provide hot water; graywater from showers and sinks waters plants in the attached greenhouse; composting toilet. (See lots of photos in the Image Gallery.)

Fourth-generation rancher Jane Koger’s roots are deeply planted in the Flint Hills of Kansas. “I came back to Chase County to buy land and ranch,” says Jane. “I was ranching on land that someone else held the lease on, and I wanted to have a little more ‘control’ over my future.” After selecting a tract of rolling prairie land, she discovered during the title search that her great-grandparents, Emma and Ezra Beedle, had originally homesteaded the property in 1882. She had come home.

The beautiful, rolling Flint Hills contain some of the last remaining tallgrass prairie in North America. The vast prairies of the Midwest were first grazed by millions of buffalo before becoming a productive breadbasket for an emerging nation. This southeast corner of Kansas was mostly spared the plow because of limestone just below the sea of green grass. With mere inches of topsoil, the land was too poor and rocky for farming.