Joe Le Vert was in Duke’s Restaurant on Walton Way one day in the early 1980s when he overheard a few teenagers talking in a nearby booth.
They were athletes from another school, and they were discussing their next game.
“They said they were going to play in the jungle,” said Le Vert.
The jungle they were referring to was Aquinas High School where Le Vert has taught for more than 40 years.
That comment stuck with Le Vert, who studied botany in college and had a landscaping business with his father for many years.
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At the time, the high school grounds were largely undeveloped, and he embarked on a mission to change the landscape — one tree at a time.
Set on 16 acres on Highland Avenue, the campus has the main school building plus the gymnasium, stadium and a weight room that was the former residence of the Marist brothers who lived on site and taught in the school.
It’s also home to a lush gardening paradise that has some flowering plant in bloom year-round.
Some of the most notable plants on the site are the multiple varieties of citrus trees as well as the different palms.
In November, Aquinas was the host site for the Southeastern Citrus Expo.
Different varieties of citrus thrive on the site, proving that some types of citrus trees can grow in locations other than Florida and California, he said.
Aquinas is in an unusual place in the city of Augusta, Le Vert said.
“It doesn’t get as cold here,” he said, citing the school’s elevation.
He’s measured the temperatures at the school and compared them to readings at Augusta Regional Airport and other parts of Augusta, and the temperatures have varied greatly. This climate helps the trees grow better on the property than they might in other parts of the area.
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Aquinas features some cirtrus trees that are purely ornamental, while others offer sweet and juicy fruits such as the kishu, a type of small mandarin orange and the yuzuquat, a hybrid lemon substitute. Some types Le Vert said are tastier in recipes rather than popped in someone’s mouth straight off the tree. One of those would be the chinotto, which does well in candy making.
And some of the trees, well, even he’s not even sure what they are. He encouraged his students to plant some seeds as an experiment to see if trees might grow from seeds students had. Seeds from some of those have sprouted. What type of fruit they will produce remains to be seen, he said. Depending on the type of tree, it could take a decade or more before it’s mature enough to produce fruit.
The palms are another type of tree that is plentiful at Aquinas; some have come great distances to reach their Highland Avenue home. A few originated in Puerto Rico and Mexico.
The grounds are the laboratory for Le Vert’s botany classes; he has a greenhouse on site as well. He said he hopes to ignite a love of plants into the next generation.
While the botany students do get time working with the plants, Le Vert has also given tours and spoken on his efforts to area gardening clubs. People are often interested in the taking tours, but he asks that they schedule one in advance and don’t just show up at the school.
He can be reached at Aquinas at (706) 736-5516.
Charmain Z. Brackett is the Features Editor for The Augusta Press. Reach her at charmain@theaugustapress.com
