Jungle Gardens at Avery Island

Subject: Science/Nature, History

Hwy. 329 (PO Box 126)
Avery Island, LA 70513

(337) 369-6243 | General Information
(337) 369-9243 | Reservations

What you need to know!

General Public Hours and Admission Rates: Daily, 9:00am – 5:00pm; $6.25 Adults 13-up, $4.50 Children 6 – 12 years old

School Tour Hours and Admission Rates: Daily, 9:00am – 5:00pm; $6.25 Adults 13-up, $4.50 Children ages 6 – 12 years old; Groups of 25 visitors or more $5.75 Adults, $4.50 children; Bus driver and one teacher per bus Free. For a tour guide to join group on the bus $10.00 per bus. $5.75 chaperones with group

Student to Chaperone Ratio Requested: 30:1
Advanced Time Needed to Make Reservations: One week
Number of Students per Visit: Unlimited
Suggested Length of Time for Visit: 90 minutes for garden tour; one hour factory tour
Handicapped Accessible: Yes
Grade Level Appropriate: 1st – 12th
Lunch Facilities: Picnic areas, vending machines, and a snack shop are available on-site. Fast-food is available in nearby New Iberia.
Gift Shop: Yes
Bus parking available

Tell Us About It!

Louisiana’s coastline, southwest of Baton Rouge, is dotted with five salt dome islands. The highest, at 152 feet, is Avery Island, home to the McIlhenny family for over 150 years. Fields of hot pepper plants, a salt mine, and the TABASCO® sauce plant are the historic industry stops on Avery Island. Jungle Gardens is a man-made oasis that spans miles of tended gardens with imported color-camellias, azaleas, wisteria, bamboo, boxwood, and other exotic plant life. Trails traverse through live oak forests, palms, marshes, and an historic bird rookery on this paradise. It was on Avery Island where, in 1866, Edmund McIlhenny concocted the now famous hot sauce that McIlhenny’s son Edward, a naturalist and conservationist, helped save the snowy egret from extinction. In 1895, when the bird was being hunted for its plumage, McIlhenny built an aviary on Avery Island and raised eight wild egrets there. Since then, thousands of egrets migrate from South America to Avery Island’s Bird City each year.

What Can We See and Do There?

By foot, car, bus, or through the air, there is much to take in at Jungle Gardens on Avery Island. Teachers can plan nature, industry, and archeology field trips. Groups may enjoy riding on the school bus or in chaperone-driven vehicles as they ride the web of gravel roads that lace through all the gardens and natural areas. For a small fee a trained tour guide will board the bus to narrate the driving tour. Visitors can disembark at the easy nature trails and garden paths. If teachers plan to see it all, their students will see 11 different garden areas: Live Oak Trees, Marsh Trail, Long Lagoons, Buddha’s Temple, Wisteria Arch, Palm Garden, Camellia Garden, Bird City, Timber Bamboo, McIlhenny’s House, and the Sunken Gardens. Groups can take in a guided tour of the Tabasco factory that begins with an orientation film. Don’t forget to inquire about the archeological digs on Avery Island! Archeological digs have been going on for over three decades.

How Do We Get There?

From I-10, exit on Hwy. 90 at Lafayette traveling south. Exit on La. 329 to Avery Island.

Bad Weather! Now What Do We Do?

When the weather is wet or extreme, expect to reschedule field trips to Jungle Gardens.

Louisiana State Educational Benchmarks and Standards

K-4th grades: S-1E-A1; LS-E-A1-4; LS-E-B1-3; LS-E-C1-3; SE-E-A1, 3, 5; G-1B-E1, 4; E-1A-E7-8; E-1B-E5; H-1C-E1-4
5th-8th grades: LS-M-A3-4; LS-M-C1, 3-4; LS-M-D1-2; SE-M-A1-2, 4; G-1B-M1-4; G-1D-M3; E-1A-M1, 4; H-1D-M1-6
9th-12th grades: LS-H-D4; SE-H-A1, 3, 8; SE-H-C1-5; G-1B-H1-4; E-1A-H2; E-1B-H6

What Can We Do In Class Before Our Field Trip

Try birding around the school grounds. Students can keep a bird-sighting journal and even try using binoculars. Keeping quiet and still is a tough call for kids first learning to set out on a nature trail! The practice will enhance their exploration at Jungle Gardens. Taste and talk about our region’s well-known hot sauce and talk about the TABASCO ® Industry’s local history. Ask the on-site historian about it at www.tabasco.com or call ahead for the site’s brochure and map/fact sheet.

S-T-R-E-T-C-H Out Your Field Trip Benefits

Great art projects await students at the Tabasco website’s “Arts Pavilion.” Lots of clip art and industry logos, images, and patterning challenges to download are on the same website. Interested in archeology? Avery Island digs are described with lots of working pictures on the same website. Consider a field trip to the Tabasco Museum in New Orleans.