By Rowan O’Connell-Gates, WFA Program Associate

Wild Farm Alliance partnered with the Napa Valley Farmworker Foundation (NVFF) recently to host a Songbird Nest Box Workshop for students in the NVFF’s Fields of Opportunity internship program at the Napa Valley Education Foundation. 

Set along the Napa River, the foundation’s three-acre campus–formerly home to the Oxbow School, founded by Robert and Margrit Mondavi–offered a fitting setting for the day’s workshop. Native plants and trees are woven throughout the grounds, while birds move freely across the campus. It was a vivid reminder of the kind of landscape Wild Farm Alliance works toward: one where people and nature thrive alongside one another.

The day brought together emerging agricultural leaders and longtime Napa Valley conservation champions, Julie Johnson, Owner/Winemaker at Tres Sabores Winery and Tom Clark of Clark-Claudon Vineyards. 

Julie, a WFA Board Member, opened the workshop with an introduction to Wild Farm Alliance and an overview of the day’s activities. WFA Program Associate Rowan O’Connell-Gates followed with a presentation on beneficial bird habitat and the role insect-eating songbirds can play in supporting healthy viticultural systems.

Julie Johnson welcomes Fields of Opportunity interns. Photo by Rowan O’Connell-Gates

With the groundwork laid, students moved from the campus’s open-air classrooms into the Napa sunshine to build their own nest boxes. Tom introduced himself and his nest box project, Aloft, before guiding the group through the assembly process. Using completed boxes as visual references, pairs of students worked with pre-cut kits, drills, screws, and glue to construct boxes they could bring back to their host vineyards and wineries.

Fields of Opportunity interns assemble nest boxes. Photo by Rowan O’Connell-Gates

The workshop offered a tangible introduction to supporting beneficial birds on working lands. Nest boxes can provide important nesting habitat for songbirds, helping bring more of these feathered farm allies into vineyard landscapes.

The Napa workshop was just one part of a larger week for WFA’s Farmland Flyways Program. Just two days earlier, and nearly 2,000 miles east of Napa, WFA hosted another Songbird Nest Box Workshop with our Minneapolis team. With support from HandsOn Twin Cities, 40 volunteers from McGough Construction joined WFA team members Courtney Tchida, Shelly Connor, and Alayna Merchlewitz to build 65 songbird nest boxes for farms across Minnesota.

McGough Construction volunteers assemble nest boxes in Minneapolis. Photo by Courtney Tchida

Together, these workshops reflect the growing momentum behind WFA’s Farmland Flyways initiative, which promotes beneficial bird habitat on farms throughout the United States. By connecting people with practical conservation tools and hands-on learning opportunities, events like these help grow the Farmland Flyways Trail while demonstrating that habitat can be a meaningful part of productive, resilient agricultural landscapes.

We’re excited to build on this momentum in November, when WFA will return to the Napa Valley to partner again with NVFF, Tom, and Julie at NVFF’s annual Cultivar event. At Cultivar, WFA’s workshop will share nest box knowledge with a Spanish-speaking audience and continue the conversation about how beneficial bird habitat can support farms, farmworkers, and the landscapes they steward.