When I first moved to Austin I always took my dog Jasper to the RedBud Isle Dog Park. Red Bud Isle is located on Town Lake close to the Lake Austin dam. It’s a cool off-leash dog park that has a main trail that loops around the isle and multiple smaller trails that wind around the denser wooded areas for dogs (and human) to frolic through.
I never thought about where the name of the park came from until I started identifying trees with an app on my phone and found multiple Eastern Redbud trees along the trails. The Redbuds have become popular for their pink-purple early spring flowers that appear on bare wood before the leaves emerge. The tree is perfect for Texas as it is drought-tolerant and thrives in limestone soils. Redbuds glossy, rounded leaves brings shade and its flowers attract pollinators such as butterflies, bees, moths, and insects.
