Eliza Springs

Eliza spring comes up from the Edwards Aquifer. The Edwards Aquifer is a natural underground reservoir with a layer of limestone rock containing water. This water enters the aquifer through caves, sinkholes and fractures on the land’s surface and flows through the large openings in the limestone. Some of the water then flows back up to the surface at the spring’s locations. Andrew Zilker built the amphitheater around Eliza Springs in the early 1900s to serve as an Elks Club meeting space that would be cooled by the natural spring water. Water leaving Eliza Spring would historically form a stream that would flow into Barton Creek through an opening in the amphitheater. When this stream was buried in the 1920s, the endangered salamanders that live in this area lost a portion of their habitat. In 2017 the City of Austin restored the stream to its natural state once again allowing the stream to provide the needed water speed and depth, hiding places and native plants that would support the life of the salamanders.