When Brewster Bartlett says he's heading to the dump, his wife, Michelle, gives a little sigh. Mostly because Bartlett will likely come home with more than he intended to throw out.

"See that bed frame," Bartlett said, proudly pointing to a painted green metal slatted frame holding up a lovely grape plant in his garden. "Got it at the dump. It was just going to get thrown away. But I saw it and thought: 'I could use that. Somewhere.' It makes a perfect trellis."

But diving for treasures to repurpose isn't Bartlett's only act of greening up the planet. He's a regular composter, uses trapped rainwater to wash veggies and water his lawn, uses the "juice" worms make from trash as fertilizer and regularly takes home shredded papers from his job as a teacher at Pinkerton Academy to make a cozy bed for his chickens and turkeys.

"I do have to be a little bit selective, otherwise I'd get to be one of those hoarders, and they'd put me on TV," Bartlett said with a chuckle. "But why get rid of something when it could get put to good use?"

Everything on the Bartlett property seems to get a second life. The shredded papers for the turkeys and chickens get thrown into another pile at the back of his property loaded with leaves. Eventually, Bartlett points out, the pile turns itself into rich black dirt he will use in his garden.

"People pay a huge amount of money at the store for dirt like that," he said. "But you don't have to."

Even the lawn ornaments are repurposed. The front of Bartlett's home was awash with dump castoffs turned Halloween ghoulies on a recent visit. Found hunks of Styrofoam were fitted onto long silver poles and decked out in masks to create the tableau of ghosties and frights, all of which were found at the local dump, Michelle Bartlett said.
Meanwhile, in the backyard of Bartlett's home on Clough Pond in Loudon, a castoff glass shelf from a relative acts as a trellis; a small grill serves as a planter; orange construction fencing tossed at the dump has become protective fencing to keep critters out of the garden. Even nets some local fishermen were getting rid of will someday cover the outdoor area for the Bartlett's turkeys to keep the hawks out, Bartlett said.

But for the Bartletts, reusing isn't relegated to found items. Hidden among blood-red beets and other garden goodies and beauties, a black compost container sits. At the bottom is a small spigot where Bartlett said he and his wife bottle up the excretions the red wigglers make when they are breaking down the refuse. He explained the excretions are full of nutrients that act as a fertilizer, which he uses instead of chemicals. He also pointed out that he used to use black plastic to tamp down weeds, but now, he simply uses matted and dead leaves from the previous season's fall.

"I hardly get any weeds at all," he said.

And then there are the times he takes his work home with him.

"I not only compost all the household waste, but I take all the coffee grounds from the science department home with me," he said. And vice versa.

"Everything I try to do at home, I bring that back to the classroom," he said. "Education is key to changing things. Explaining why we need to recycle, why we need to not use chemicals whenever possible. . . . If you do it, they'll do it. And it'll serve the planet in the long run because these kids are the voters and doers of the future."

And he learned that at a young age. Bartlett said that as a kid growing up in Lancaster his first foray into recycling was more out of necessity than care. "We didn't have a lot of money growing up, so we would go around the fairgrounds picking up all the bottles for the deposits," he said. "But you know in the '70s, we were such a throw-away society. I mean they still had open pit burning, and everything was thrown away. As I got older and started hearing about all the environmental disasters like Love Canal and DDT, I think we all started to change."

Bartlett started small, sort of. In 1989, he headed up a student and faculty environmental group that led the way to recycling at the school. Though there were some years when the group was less active, recent years have seen resurgence. Students lobbied to have all the towels in the building changed to a more environmentally friendly variety, and eventually the group will look at ways to save energy at the school. But their biggest accomplishment, Bartlett said, is that starting next month, Pinkerton will be the first school in the state to begin single-stream recycling, which means everything will be sent to a facility in Massachusetts for recycling.

"It's unbelievable," Bartlett said. "And if our program is successful, maybe then other schools will do it, too."

By Melanie Plenda