Arizona couple transforms pool into sustainable garden
TEMPE, Ariz. – Over the years, they talked about turning their 30-year-old swimming pool into a garden, but it was always in a joking manner.
Then in 2016, a very serious event made it happen. Almost immediately.
Candy Lesher-rainey and David Rainey’s 9-year-old Chihuahua, Zorro, suffered a seizure, fell into the pool and drowned.
Subsequent discussions were far from funny. Lesher-rainey, who never curses, threw out a few choice words when describing how she felt about that pool.
“When this happened, I said, ‘I want that (expletive) pool gone,’” she recalled. “At that moment, it was just done . ... I didn’t want to lose another life that way.”
Her husband was in full agreement. About a week later, what was the site of tragedy became a symbol of life and sustainability they call Zorro’s Garden.
More than draining and filling
The pool-to-garden foundation transformation took a week.
About five minutes after accepting the reality of losing Zorro, Candy was on the phone with the city of Tempe. She explained what she wanted to do and asked if there was anything she needed to know.
If anyone thinks the project is as simple as draining the water and filling it with dirt, Lesher-rainey suggests they think again. Hard.
“We did everything to code. You can’t just fill in the pool. People think you can,” she said.
The city was extremely helpful and guided the couple through the process. After knowing the game plan, they found a local family-owned swimming pool company that also does pool removal. They would do it without taking out the mature trees and privacy walls to get their equipment in, which was key.
The process involved cutting out channels at the bottom of the dry pool, which spanned 16 feet by 32 feet, with a deep end of 6 feet.
Next, it was filled with layers of chunks of concrete, coarse rocks and finer rocks to allow for good drainage.
“If water is stagnated at the bottom, you’re going to have a Chernobyl microbial meltdown in your backyard,” Lesher-rainey said.
Then dirt and four Suburbans worth of organic potting soil were placed on top. Once the foundation was set, the planting would commence.
However, there was an unexpected mental hurdle. The pool’s original front and sides were kept intact so although
the Raineys saw a large swatch of soil, the decades of memory muscle were trained to see a bed of water. It took another week for the couple to break that spontaneous reaction. They weren’t alone – their three rescue dogs felt the same.
“We did not want to step off the edge! It was so funny that it took us so long to get comfortable to step into what used to be a pool,” Candy said.
Of course, they did, and the blank canvas was ready.
Seasonal crops, produce savings and learning to ‘roll with it’
As a chef and culinary wellness coach, Lesher-rainey had her eye on staples like tomatoes, heirloom carrots and zucchini – foods that grew well and, if she had a bumper crop, were easy to dry or freeze. She also opted to grow fruits and vegetables that are most likely to be treated with pesticides, known as the “Dirty Dozen.”
Lesher-rainey has a pretty steady schedule for her seasonal garden. Right now, she’s looking at a winter crop that usually pulls heavily on kimchi ingredients: daikon, Napa cabbage and bok choy. Rapini and heirloom carrots are also in the mix.
“There’s a joy to having all these different colors. It puts a smile on your face,” Lesher-rainey said.
The spring crop will likely produce I’itoi onions, carrots, Easter radishes and red cipollini onions, which Lesher-rainey likes to roast on a grill.
“Nothing in the world complements a steak better than that,” she said.
Soon, Lesher-rainey will plant tomato seeds she’s saved from her previous plants.
“They will do better next year because they are genetically adjusted to the microclimate of the backyard,” she said.
Tomatoes and squash thrive in the summer. Two 10-foot-by-10-foot gazebos and a 50% shade screen help shield plants from the direct sunlight and keeps them cooler so production continues later into the summer.
A stroll through the space features thriving non-edibles like lantana, passion berry and a 14-foot tall honeysuckle. There are grape vines, squash, peppers and warmth-loving eggplant.
Two dwarf mulberry trees produce the most abundant sweet crops, and a Spanish blood orange tree named Ruby stands nearby. A compost pile sits a short distance away from a Meyer lemon tree. An Italian lemon tree with origins on the Umbrian coast is Lesherrainey’s pride and joy.
The garden is lush and prosperous. Lesher-rainey estimates their produce bill has dropped by 2⁄3 since it started producing.
The Raineys receive a lot of guidance from farmer Greg Peterson of Urbanfarm.org, who has played a key role in their success. For example, they don’t replace or till the soil. They just add more to the top.
“You disturb the microbial when you do it. As the garden settles, we add more,” Lesher-rainey said.
Every season continues to be a learning experience. There have been fun surprises – like the speckled lettuce species that finds a way to grow in the desert climate – and disappointments, like the spider mites that hibernated during the winter in her tomato plants and attacked them when they awoke.
“Part of the gardening thing is, you know there’s going to be failures,” Lesher-rainey said. “You figure out what worked and what didn’t and next year, roll with it.”
A cozy LEED home to go with an organic garden
Rainey purchased the home in the late 1980s, before the couple married. Built in the early 1970s, the cozy, singlestory, 1,200-square-foot property features two bedrooms and one bathroom.
It sits in a cul-de-sac, which offers an additional element of privacy. The deep front yard is home to rescue cacti from Lake Pleasant that mingle among citrus trees and the beloved Violette de Bordeaux fig tree.
The house is Leed-certified, which fits well with the organic garden that sees no chemicals and benefits from worm castings and cedar oil, which is sprayed to deter crickets, scorpions and spiders.
Yielding more joy than a pool
A self-taught chef, instructor, writer and speaker, Lesher-rainey is a former publisher and editor who has been inducted into Arizona’s Culinary Hall of Fame. She hosted and produced Food & Life Television for three years.
Rainey is a broadcast engineer who retired from the city of Glendale, Arizona. They live with their three rescue dogs, who love running around the garden and soaking up its vibe, too.
Real estate-wise, a swimming pool is considered an asset. Lesher-rainey understands that but also knows that for some, the attraction runs its course. The pool was 30 years old and needed to be refinished to the tune of $12,000 to $15,000. The total cost of the garden was $9,000.
Rainey spent every weekend doing some kind of pool maintenance chore, from brushing and skimming to backwashing and chemical monitoring. The kids and grandkids were grown and gone.
The benefits had run out. Zorro’s heartbreaking death made it clear.
Five years later, Lesher-rainey beams from ear to ear and there’s an excited bounce in her voice when she talks about the effect of Zorro’s namesake: the passion berry and lantana that draw the kaleidoscope of butterflies that join her and Rainey on the patio every morning; the soothing sounds of a fountain that attracts many species of birds; the wild lovebirds that feed in the backyard between nesting in the front yard.
Among the verdancy, it’s almost like stepping into the tropics.
“The joy that we get from it has been exponentially larger than the joy we ever got from having the pool,” Lesherrainey said. “It’s our little piece of nature right in the middle of the city.”