Fence work, maintaining irrigation systems, pushing cows, roping and branding and wrestling and vaccinating, and a lot of time outside. That’s what Joe Zecher thought working on a cattle ranch this spring and summer would be like, and he was right.
But Zecher, 19, isn’t a regular ranch hand: His two weeks at the Compton Ranch in the Lower Boulder Valley will help earn him three college credits, and his rotation at the ranch last month was just the first of five consecutive two-week stints at different working ranches around Montana. Zecher, a wildlife biology major and wilderness studies minor who just finished his sophomore year at University of Montana, is one of four interns accepted this year into the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation’s Working Lands Internship. This particular paid internship was his choice, but the three credits it confers are required for his major.
He was at the Compton Ranch May 16–27. May 30 through June 10 he’s in Baker. After that, he’ll continue crisscrossing the state from Winifred to Nye and, finally, Ekalaka. Each DNRC intern visits different ranches from the others, meaning 20 total ranches statewide get an intern for two weeks.
