Road Tripping to Willamette University’s Zena Land
The Zena property team grows squash and seasonal produce in their greenhouse and growing areas
Willamette University has an unusual 305-acre living educational laboratory known as the Zena property.
Willamette University Farm Club student leaders Hope Heideman and Arabella Wood with some Zena-grown squash
Bon Appétit Fellow Shannon Tivona recently drove west from the Salem, OR-based campus to the Eola Hills with Arabella Wood and Hope Heideman, student leaders of Willamette’s 30-member Farm Club, to check it out.
The three toured Zena’s greenhouse and other growing areas; the property includes oak and mixed-species woodland, riparian areas, grassland areas, wetlands, and freshwater aquatic areas. A few years ago, the Farm Club had lost access to the Zena land but has since regained use and are filled with new ideas — including leveraging greater use of the crops in collaboration with the Bon Appétit team.
Thanks to the passion of the club’s leaders, there’s also an effort underway to transfer this knowledge to younger students and document best practices to give them a leg up. This way, the club’s future leaders will be able to carry the land’s legacy forward into all the productive growing seasons ahead.