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The Austin Herb Society is dedicated to educating members and the community about herbs, including propagation, landscaping, history and folklore, plus culinary, medicinal, and decorative uses of herbs.

Upcoming January Public Meeting

Wild About Plants!

Denise Delaney

Tuesday, January 2, 2024 10:00 am

at Zilker Botanical Garden, Auditorium

Grow Green is a City of Austin water quality education program that encourages people to make landscaping choices that benefit the environment, emphasizing using "the right plant in the right place" philosophy. Central Texas climate has many extremes, so the plants have to be Texas tough! Understanding what makes them capable of surviving the regional environment, and the importance of site-specific conditions, is essential to making informed plant selection decisions. We will also talk about invasive plants, Waterwise rebates, cisterns, and rain gardens.

Denise Delaney is the Watershed Protection Department's Acting Education Program Manager. Her professional horticultural roots are 40 years deep in Central Texas. She has coordinated the Grow Green program since 2004. Before that, she was the first Director of Horticulture at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. She worked closely with Mrs. Johnson during the construction and installation of the original gardens and growing operation. Other experience includes working for landscape design, installation, and maintenance companies on private estates, retail nurseries, and at the University of Texas - Austin.

Free and open to the public, tell gate you're attending the AHS meeting

Grow Green Program

Upcoming February Public Meeting

Soup Social & Plant Sale Prep

Tuesday, February 6, 2024 10:00 am

at Zilker Botanical Garden, Auditorium

Enjoy delicious soups made by AHS members and organized by the Culinary study group Chairs. We'll taste several soups and do some planning for the AHS Spring Plant Sale Fundraiser on March 23-24, 2024. This is our one fundraiser all year to pay for plants we donate and plant in Zilker Botanical Garden's Herb Garden. You'll still have plenty of time for socializing afterward.

Free and open to the public, tell gate you're attending the AHS meeting

News of Interest

AHS member Judith Craft wins Volunteer Legend Award!

The RecognizeGood organization honored our own Judith Craft at a ceremony with an award, a brick on the Butler Trail at Lady Bird Lake and a $1000 check to Zilker Botanical Garden Conservancy.

She has been cultivating plants and students' minds for over 30 years with AHS & ZBG.

Stay tuned for more details on the Say Thanks, Austin campaign that happens in January and gives Team Judith Craft a chance for a $10,000 donation in her name by rallying folks from all over to cast Thank You votes.

See the video about Judith's amazing volunteer work

and Judith's award ceremony:

https://youtu.be/fUJiXzjQi8M

For all the details and more photos:

https://recognizegood.org/legends/judith-craft/

Austin Herb Society Celebrates 40 years!

Our Austin Area Garden Council club has served Austin with education and gardening at Mayfield Park, then Zilker Botanical Garden near the parking lot with the Rosemary statue (the current hummingbird garden), and now in the large Herb Garden along the stairs in a prime location that used to be in the Rose Garden.

We've donated tens of thousands of dollars in plants and thousands of hours maintaining the herb garden, volunteered at Zilker Botanical Garden events such as Woodland Faerie Homes Trail, educated the public via our monthly programs and speakers, plus AHS originated the Talks and Walks in the Garden program.

And we've had fun together along the way with member field trips, culinary study group lunches, medicinal and skincare product making study groups, and members home garden tours.

About Austin Herb Society & Zilker Herb Garden

Since 1982, the Austin Herb Society has been educating members and the community about herbs, including propagation, landscaping, history, folklore, and culinary, medicinal, and decorative uses of herbs. While our members are united by an interest in herbs, they are also a diverse group of individuals: from gardeners and herbalists to cooks and business owners.

AHS members design and maintain the Zilker Herb Garden—a dazzling landscape of color and fragrance that has become a centerpiece of Zilker Botanical Garden. Here, visitors can touch, taste and smell their way through nearly 200 varieties of herbs, depending on the season. Bees and butterflies dot the beds of basil, lavender and calendula. There are classic culinary herbs like rosemary, mint and thyme alongside herbs revered for their health attributes, including aloe and echinacea.