Herb Garden, Gardener II

Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery; San Marino (CA); On-site; USD 45,000 - 65,000; Full time

Job summary

The Huntington Garden team seeks a Gardener II to lead day-to-day horticulture in the Herb Garden. You will help maintain health, beauty, and visitor presentation while supporting garden plans and new plantings.

Under supervision, you will work with volunteers and staff to ensure horticultural quality and educational value across adjacent gardens, including seasonal installations and garden improvements.

Qualifications

• Experience in garden maintenance including pruning, planting, and seasonal transitions.
• Ability to monitor plant health and participate in integrated pest and disease management.
• Familiarity with soil health practices and basic irrigation troubleshooting.

Responsibilities

• Maintains the Herb Garden daily through pruning, planting, watering, weeding, mulching, and debris removal.
• Identifies routine garden needs and sets daily/weekly priorities aligned with garden plans.
• Supports plant propagation and seasonal plantings to sustain the collection and educational goals.

Skills

Pruning

Planting

Irrigation

Weeding

Soil care

Propagation

Education

Horticulture certificate

Tools

Irrigation systems

Mulching tools

Pruning shears

Job description

About Us

At The Huntington, we believe that having a team of diverse backgrounds and voices working together will enable us to support and promote the appreciation of the humanities, the arts, and botanical science. The Huntington is proud to be an equal opportunity employer and is committed to providing employment opportunities regardless of race, religious creed, color, national origin, disability, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation or any other characteristic protected by local, state or federal law.

The Huntington

Founded in 1919, The Huntington is a collections-based research and educational institution open to the public, housing world-class library, art, and botanical collections. Its mission is to support research and promote education in the arts, humanities, and botanical science and to display and interpret its extraordinary resources for diverse audiences.

The Culture

Here we are committed to the highest of standards in all that we do - from preserving and protecting the collections, to exhibitions, educational and scholarly programming, visitor and reader services, and beyond. Achieving excellence across these pursuits requires a diversity of perspectives, expertise, experience, and methodologies.

At The Huntington, our organizational Culture is shaped by the following core values: Intellectual curiosity, Collaboration, Stewardship, Belonging, and Integrity.

Intellectual Curiosity: Knowledge, lifelong learning, and a spirit of inquiry are at the core of our mission and organizational culture.

Collaboration: Teamwork and a collaborative attitude are important at all levels of The Huntington. We foster relationships internally among our departments and externally with organizations throughout the community.

Stewardship: We are committed to the care and development of our collections, our financial and physical resources, our staff, and our community.

Belonging: We strive to attract and maintain a workforce of individuals with diverse talents, backgrounds, and perspectives. Our organizational culture promotes a sense of welcome, inclusion, and connection.

Integrity: We value respect and honesty, working to fulfill our mission with honor and ethical principles.

Job Description

About the Role

The Gardener II works primarily in The Huntington's Herb Garden and serves as the primary day-to-day horticultural lead responsible for maintaining the health, quality, beauty, organization, and visitor presentation of its diverse living collections.

Working under the direction of the Curator/Horticultural Manager, the Gardener II independently identifies routine horticultural needs, establishes and executes daily and weekly maintenance priorities consistent with established collection and garden plans, and supports implementation of new plantings, seasonal transitions, garden improvements, and collection-development projects.

The Herb Garden connects visitors with plants through horticulture, medicine, food, fragrance, culture, history, ethnobotany, and other human-plant relationships. The Gardener II supports both the horticultural quality and educational value of these collections and works with volunteers, interns, docents, educators, and other Huntington staff as appropriate.

While primarily assigned to the Herb Garden, the Gardener II works collaboratively across the Rose, Herb, and Shakespeare Gardens and may support seasonal priorities, installations, propagation, special projects, events, and major horticultural activities in those gardens as directed.

S/he/they will demonstrate a background of working directly with people from diverse racial, ethnic, geographic and socioeconomic backgrounds, using a welcoming, inclusive, and accessible approach.

Essential Duties

• Maintains the Herb Garden on a daily basis through skilled pruning, planting, transplanting, watering, weeding, edging, grooming, staking, training, fertilizing, mulching, deadheading, soil care, and removal of debris.
• Independently assesses routine garden conditions and identifies and executes daily and weekly horticultural priorities consistent with established garden plans and direction.
• Maintains woody and herbaceous perennials, annuals, seasonal plantings, vines, shrubs, trees and specialized collections represented within the Herb Garden.
• Implements soil-health practices including composting, mulching, top-dressing, amendments, and other practices supporting long-term plant health.
• Monitors irrigation performance, performs routine adjustments and troubleshooting, and communicates larger repair or infrastructure needs.
• Monitors plant health and assists with integrated pest management, disease management, weed control, and other horticultural interventions.
• Implements approved garden designs, collection changes, plant palettes, seasonal transitions, renovations, and new installations.
• Supports plant propagation for collection preservation, replacement, garden development, education, and other approved purposes.