“I always liked the idea of having a garden.”

Gloucester Master Gardener Susan Camp of Hayes, has spent the past 30 years cultivating her home garden with the help of her husband Jim.

For much of their lives, Susan and Jim could not have a garden due to his Air Force career. Before purchasing their current home, the couple settled down in York County for some time while Jim worked in Gloucester and Susan worked in Newport News, where they were able to have a vegetable patch and grow herbs and flowers.

Now, the couple has several flower beds in front of their house, a vegetable garden, an herb patch and plants galore.

Living so close to a creek that filters into the York River and the greater Chesapeake Bay, Susan said they “have a real responsibility to protect this property and protect the creek.”

This includes not using toxic weed killer, almost no fertilizer and not spraying for mosquitoes, lest any chemicals wash out into the creek. Instead, they allow the dragonfli...