A Garden Goes To Waste

Dan Keayes spends 8 hours a day supervising the town’s Bayberry Lane yard waste site.  He lets very little of his time — or whatever Westporters throw in the brush pile — got to, um, waste.

Over the past few years, Dan has built a handsome garden on a formerly forlorn dirt pile.  Filled with sea grass, boxwoods — even a fig tree — it wraps around the entire building, behind the Westport-Weston Health District.  Every living thing — plus wood chips and a birdhouse — was salvaged from nearby piles.

Plenty of stuff gets tossed there that shouldn’t.  Once, every morning for a week, Dan found rocks (illegal to dump).  He simply incorporated them into his creation.  “If life gives you rocks, make a rock garden,” he philosophizes.

Dan Keayes stands near a small part of his creation.

The Monroe resident — a yard waste attendant for 15 years, at North Compo and North Avenue prior to his present location — says the garden is now self-maintaining.  He trims a bit, and weeds here and there.  But the garden takes care of itself.

Dan learns about gardening as he goes.  Martha Stewart’s former landscaper has been a big help, teaching Dan about plants he doesn’t know.

Dan is unsure what his supervisors think.  “I don’t know if anyone in charge knows what I do,” he laughs.

They may not.  But anyone dumping brush does.

And they love it.