Xeriscaping in Austin is less about giving something up and more about finally planting what belongs here. The Hill Country is one of the most beautiful landscapes in America — live oaks, limestone, wine-red salvias, clouds of muhly grass — and every bit of it runs on a fraction of the water a St. Augustine lawn drinks. With hotter summers, multi-year droughts, and watering restrictions that keep tightening, the case has never been easier to make.

Century plant agaves with bluebonnets and live oaks at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin
Agaves, bluebonnets, and live oaks at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin — the Hill Country palette at work. — Photo: Carol M. Highsmith, public domain

Austin's growing conditions (know before you plant)

  • Hardiness zone: 8b to 9a. Mild winters, but the occasional hard freeze (everyone remembers 2021) argues for proven natives over borderline tropicals. (New to zones? Read our hardiness zone guide.)
  • Feast-or-famine rain. Around 34 inches a year on paper — but delivered in floods and droughts, not gentle averages. Plants must handle both extremes.
  • Thin, alkaline soils. West of I-35 you're gardening on inches of soil over limestone (caliche); east of it, heavy blackland clay. Natives evolved for exactly this — imported plants mostly didn't.
  • Brutal summer heat. Triple digits for weeks. Full-sun beds need genuinely heat-proof plants, not "drought-tolerant" in the marketing sense.

The best xeriscape plants for Austin

The Hill Country palette is deep and gorgeous:

Shrubs: cenizo (Texas sage — silver leaves, purple blooms after rain), agarita, flame acanthus, dwarf yaupon holly, and evergreen sumac.

Cenizo (Texas sage) with silver leaves covered in purple blooms
Cenizo (Texas sage) — silver foliage year-round, purple fireworks after every rain.

Perennials: salvia greggii (autumn sage), blackfoot daisy, damianita, mealy blue sage, rock penstemon, zexmenia, and four-nerve daisy. All bloom through heat that flattens everything else.

Grasses: Gulf muhly (pink clouds in fall), Lindheimer's muhly, and sideoats grama — the state grass. More options in our ornamental grasses guide.

Gulf muhly grass with airy pink flower plumes
Gulf muhly throwing its pink clouds — the Hill Country's best fall show.

Accents: red yucca (hesperaloe), twistleaf yucca, spineless prickly pear, and century plant for sculptural punch.

Trees: live oak, Texas redbud, desert willow, and Mexican plum all earn their water.

Texas even maintains a free plant-picking tool — Texas SmartScape — that filters natives and adapted plants by region. It's worth a browse before you buy anything.

Rebates and rules: check before you dig

  • Austin Water has historically offered landscape conversion incentives and WaterWise rebates for replacing turf with native beds — programs and amounts change, so check their current offerings (and get any required pre-approval) before you remove grass. Our rebate guide explains how these programs typically work.
  • Watering restrictions are the norm, with stage-based schedules most of the year. A xeriscape mostly opts out of the whole drama.
  • If you're in an HOA, submit a simple plan first — Texas law generally protects drought-tolerant landscaping, but process still matters.

Design notes for the Hill Country look

  • Limestone is the material. Chopped limestone borders, flagstone paths, and boulders read instantly local — skip the red lava rock.
  • Plant for the flood, too. Use berms and a dry creek bed to route the occasional four-inch downpour away from foundations.
  • Shade is a design element. A live oak's canopy cools everything under it; plant shade-tolerant natives like turk's cap beneath rather than fighting for sun.
  • Keep a green patch if you want one — buffalograss or a buffalograss–blue grama blend stays soft on a fraction of St. Augustine's water.

Getting started

  1. Check Austin Water's current incentives and get pre-approved if required.
  2. Remove the lawn — solarization works beautifully in an Austin summer.
  3. Follow the 10 Steps to Xeriscaping: plan, plant in fall (Austin's best planting season), drip-irrigate, and mulch.
  4. Water deeply the first year, then let the natives do what they've always done.

Costs track the national picture — see what xeriscaping costs — and if you're comparing notes with neighbors down I-35, our San Antonio guide covers the same conversation one aquifer over.

An Austin yard full of cenizo, muhly, and salvia isn't a sacrifice. It's the Hill Country moving back in.