Yew Dell and the Hummingbird Festival

The Summer may be winding down but that doesn’t mean you need to be spending less time outdoors. In fact, I think that these days heading in to the Fall months are some of the best days to plan your outdoor adventures. One of Oldham County’s gems, and a Nationally-recognized center for gardening and horticulture is Yew Dell. If you live in Oldham County or anywhere in the Louisville area, the Yew Dell Botanical Gardens is an excellent place for a day trip where you can bring the whole family or bring a couple of friends and explore some options for your home garden.

Yew Dell Botanical Gardens is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Preservation Project of the Garden Conservatory which is a national non-profit that helps preserve the Nation’s most impressive gardens. Yew Dell is full of beautiful gardens and sustainable horticulture. They offer educational programs, display gardens, community events that cater towards families, private event facilities, and ongoing research into new and better gardening plants and techniques.  

Yew Dell is constantly changing with the times and making sure that they are up to date with the most recent technology. They recently announced that in honor of their 10th anniversary they will be adding a collection of new horticulture facilities. The project will include a new solar/geothermal greenhouse complete with a green roof, plant growing and propagation space, and a teaching and workshop space with room for modest exhibits. There will also be unique production facilities for fall/winter vegetable research evaluation work. Yew Dell plans to build an all-encompassing facility, combining evaluation fields for vegetable and ornamental crops and updated container production facilities. If this is all mumbo jumbo to you, I understand, but the bottom line is that Yew Dell is doing some really cool stuff in the world of gardening and sustainable horticulture and it is right in Oldham County waiting for you to visit.  

Yew Dell offers ongoing classes and events that will appeal to almost everyone. Saturday August 25 is the Hummingbird Festival at Yew Dell. The Hummingbird Festival will give you the rare opportunity to view hummingbirds up close and learn all about these fascinating birds. There will be kids activities, hummingbird plants for sale, and refreshments available. It is sure to be a unique event and a great time. Sunday August 26 is Children in the Dell. An ongoing class at Yew Dell, this class is open to children ages 5-12 and gives them the opportunity to learn about gardening, the woods, hiking, and everything outdoors, straight from the experts. The class starts at 10:30am and is $5 for members and $10 for non-members. Check with the website, Yew Dell Gardens, for more date and time information.

Not only are there many classes available at Yew Dell, but there are a variety of tours and programs too. Yew Dell has so much to offer everyone, even beyond the gardener, chef, outdoorsmen, artist, or eco-friendly builder. It is places like Yew Dell that make Oldham County and the Louisville area such an amazing place to call home.