Phosphate mining has long meant jobs — and worries — in Central Florida. Ambivalence is growing as a mining company seeks to significantly expand its reach, with some fearing the land and water will “never be the same.”
Its name suggests danger or desolation, and the 1.3-million-acre stretch of Central Florida known as Bone Valley is indeed a land raked by excavators, tainted by waste and rife with tensions.
Since the late 1800s, most of the phosphate mined in the United States — for use in producing fertilizer — has been extracted here. The industry has long provided a bounty of jobs but also has had a profound impact on the landscape, especially on the waterway that wends through the region and sustains citrus farms, cattle ranches and small towns. Its name is equally evocative: Peace River.
With the Mosaic Co. now pushing to greatly expand its local mining operation, concerns about contamination and fish kills are rising. For many of the people who live in Bone Valley and depend on the Peace River, the future seems increasingly tenuous.
A Peace River mural on the side of a bank building in Wauchula.
Tourists looking for bone fossils in a shallow spot of the Peace River in Brownville.
“I worked for Agrico — it was an old mine — then IMC bought them out, and then Mosaic bought them out, and now they own everything. … When I got here, they wanted this property so bad, but I said, ‘No, it ain’t for sale, I ain’t going to sell it.’ They wanted to dig more this way and get more phosphate.”
John Garcia (left) with taxidermy business partner Hank Henry, in Bowling Green
The tannin-stained waters of the Peace River, which Native Seminoles call Tallackchopo.
“Our mission statement is we help the world grow the food it needs — it’s a fact that our people are proud of. For them, it means jobs, but jobs with purpose because they understand that at the end of the day, when you're breaking bread around the dinner table, odds are it started right here in central and southwest Florida with phosphate.”
Jackie Barron, spokesperson, the Mosaic Co.
A ‘stack’ of phosphogypsum, the radioactive waste from processing phosphate, in Bartow.
“I remember [when] my dad brought us to our new house on the Peace River. I ran out in the backyard, and I laid down on the seawall and I looked over. The water’s about four feet deep, it’s clear, the sea grasses are waving. I’m seeing these little inch-long shrimp darting everywhere and … a school of mullet swims by, and I see a stingray swim by coming the other way. It was like the river jumped up into me right then.”
Paul DeGaeta, ship captain, fishing guide and river activist, in Harbour Heights
Turkey vultures over a stream flowing south from Lake Hancock into the Peace River.
“Maybe two or three years ago, you could stand on an embankment, and you could just see the fish going up the river migrating all the way up. But now you don’t even see the mullets like you used to. You don’t see the snook like you used to, you don’t see the bream like you used to.”
Oscar Mendoza, fisherman, in Zolfo Springs
Along the banks of the Peace River near Gardner.
“The whole nature of the river has changed extraordinarily as a result of 100 years of strip mining … Part of the phosphate land is just going to get sacrificed. It’ll never be the same.”
Dennis Mader, executive director of People for Protecting Peace River, in Ona
A 2021 DeSoto County public workshop on phosphate mining in Arcadia.
“I have half an acre inside approximately 32,000 acres of Mosaic [company] land. That’s where we live. I decided when I saw this place in 1976 … this was the place to be. There was a little tiny house here, but that was where my chicken pens are now. In 1995, the mines tried to buy the place. We told them no. We still have their letter.”
Rose Johnson (left) with Sandy Williams, in Bartow
A citrus orchard harvest in Fort Meade.
“Both of my grandfathers were from Georgia. They moved here because they heard there was money growing on trees, but they came to find out that the money growing on trees was oranges. … On my mum’s side, they ended up working in phosphate, and my dad’s on railroad construction, laying the tracks.”
Lorenzo McCutchin, pastor and community activist, in Homeland
Mining dock ruins in the former phosphate town of Liverpool.
An airboat tour ride upstream from Nocatee.
A conference room at the Mulberry Phosphate Museum.
“The last couple of weeks I’ve just been traveling around Florida trying to find cool places to find fossils. I’m a complete stranger to this place. I’m just sort of winging it. After this, I’m heading out west again and then heading home. … I’m going to be studying marine science and then helping work with sturgeon.”
Fisher Clarke, a future college freshman, in Brownville
An abandoned trailer near the river in Bowling Green.
“We collect and refurbish filter elements for commercial water filtration systems. We don’t need much space, so we just work out of this storage unit. Them phosphate mines are coming this way next, just down the road by the river. They just come on through, strip mine the land and leave.”
Randi Stephenson, with Vicky Stephenson, in Arcadia
A golf course built on a former phosphate mine in Bowling Green.
“It's a little slow right now. It's mostly blue crab that we get from the river. We're getting just enough to survive, but that's because we're on a bit of a down cycle. These things tend to go up and down every few years.”
Jerry Collins, manager of the Peace River Seafood Market, in Punta Gorda
A wrecked boat on Cow Island near the river’s end.
About this story
Photos by Dane Rhys. Videos by Max Posner. Photo editing by Olivier Laurent. Project editing by Susan Levine. Copy editing by Susan Doyle. Design and development by Gabriel Florit.
Dane Rhys is an Australian photojournalist, now based in the United States, with a background in mining. He documents industrial workers and their communities. On Instagram @dane.rhys
Max Posner is a photographer and multimedia producer based on the East Coast. His work explores the intersections of humans with the natural world. On Instagram @maxwellives