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Letter to the editor

Their green oasis

Valrico - Caring for the Earth has shaped this couple's home.

By ELIZABETH BETTENDORF, Times Correspondent
Published January 25, 2008

Gardeners Lori and Joe Symington knew the meaning of "green living" long before Ed Begley had his own reality show on HGTV.

Take a look at their garden on an acre in rural Valrico and it becomes clear: More than 40 truckloads of free mulch dumped happily by a tree trimming company blankets their driveway and quilts much of their yard.

"We spread it out wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow," says Joe, 51, a computer technician for Bright House Networks.

Their mission in 2008: no more lawn!

The couple rescued almost all their plants, with permission, from a place they refer to as "the magic forest" - an abandoned trailer park awaiting development.

In four years, they've planted 37 trees (Japanese plums, ficus, eucalyptus, rain trees) and 40 banana and plantain trees.

The "before" pictures tell the story.

"Just powdery dirt - that's all that was here. It was horrible," recalls Lori, 54, an artist who specializes in portraits.

The couple have three grown children at home, including Lori's 35-year-old son, who has Down's syndrome. They live on less than $40,000 a year.

They built their 12-foot-by-40-foot greenhouse from screens that were "seconds" and salvaged wood planking. Their plant misters were free at a Hillsborough County Extension Service workshop along with their rain barrels.

They found their gutters in the trash.

Besides harvesting what other people don't want, the Symingtons throw away little themselves. All food waste except meat is composted. Seeds from fruits as well as their own harvests are saved for future plantings. Sheets and clothes are often dried on an outdoor clothesline to conserve energy.

A recycled wooden bunk bed serves as a hanging plant display; salvaged metal light-up reindeer will be transformed into an ivy topiary. Using a compass and mathematical calculations, they even built their own sundial clock using discarded materials and river rocks. The clock's spokes divide planting areas used for growing herbs and flowers.

"Anyone can do this, anyone can live this way," Joe says. Besides saving the planet, they're saving money at a time when talk of the economy is glum. "Who needs to spend $20 going to the movies or waste money eating out? I'd rather buy a plant."

On a cool day in January, James Taylor's Greatest Hits wafted from a cassette player in the greenhouse as the Symingtons took a visitor on a tour of their yard.

"It cost us $200 to build our greenhouse," says Joe, who grew up in Hyde Park, N.Y.

The son of a builder who was devoted to preserving the native landscape, Joe says he developed his passion for nature and gardening as a child playing in the lush New York state countryside that was his back yard.

Lori grew up in West Tampa and inherited her love of gardening from her grandmother, who cultivated roses at her home near Lowry Park. Now Lori teaches those same values to her granddaughter Abbie Jewel Johnson, 5, whom she babysits several days a week. Abbie planted her own rain tree in the garden and made her own handmade sign announcing her efforts: "Abbie's gynormous rain tree."

The Symingtons, who married five years ago, both joke they are "hippies" with a passion for peace, nature and conservation. Joe went to Woodstock when he was 13 and still reads Abbie Hoffman. They met at Denny's and knew almost immediately they were kindred spirits: both wear lots of intricate, colorful tattoos depicting what's important to them, including Celtic crosses for Joe's Irish heritage and twining vines and flowers for Lori's love of gardening.

"We both have the same interactions with people who don't want to speak to us or get to know us," Joe says.

Adds Lori: "We don't drink, we don't do drugs, we just do our garden. There's nowhere we'd rather be."

Their house is a cozy cottage brimming with treasures, both found and sentimental: A mannequin wears Lori's grandmother's dainty outfit and cloche hat from the 1920s; the jukebox, electric Valentine's Day sign, mid-century modern coffee table and massive wooden schoolteacher's desk were all salvaged from trash heaps. The dining room table is a painted, stenciled, polyurethane picnic table (also a trash treasure) decorated with words such as "imagine" and "believe." Lori's paintings fill the walls and her easel, including one in progress of her grown daughter.

Another one of Lori's inventions - a hand-carved, light-up peace sign painted with people of all colors - greets visitors at the front door.

In the dining room, a serenely lit display of healing crystals is offset by small waterfalls. Next to it, a beautiful set of dehydrating drawers Lori built for drying herbs and seeds (all herbs are harvested and dried; seeds are replanted).

Their 20-foot-by-60-foot vegetable garden on the back end of their property provides nourishment for much of the year: They grow corn, sugar snap peas, green beans, peppers, Brussels sprouts, watermelon and strawberries.

This year, they plan to try their hand at growing a mango tree.

The Symingtons use no insecticides or herbicides, just a homemade solution of diluted dish-soap, rubbing alcohol and vegetable oil. In the hottest stretch of Florida summer, they barely water thanks to the 18 inches of mulch protecting most of their trees, shrubs and plants. Next to their deck, Joe digs down with his hand to reveal how moist it remains even during a week when there has been relatively little rainfall.

The house is backed up by a generator and their water comes from a well. If a hurricane hits, they will survive.

"I got a letter from the county once asking if we would rather have county water," Joe recalls. "My response was 'hmmm ... good clean water from the aquifer or recycled wastewater?'"

In 2003, they bought their cozy house on an acre lot in an area that remains semirural despite its proximity to State Road 60. They paid $100,000 for the land and house, a small price for their own little oasis.

They've named it Sovereign Valley - a nod to their love of peace and protecting the environment. They are also building a Web site devoted to their little house, land and gardens - a place they plan never to let go.

Says Joe: "We tell our kids and grandkids that long after we're gone, we'd like to keep this in the family."

Elizabeth Bettendorf can be reached at ebettendorf@hotmail.com.

[Last modified January 25, 2008, 02:08:12]