ineedbook: What was it like being a ranger? I've been thinking about it as a possible career bc I love the outdoors but I just don't know enough from actual rangers. Stuff online is like not helpful at all lol
hey friend! i know online info can be kinda vague, so i’ll try to give you a summary of my personal experience
what i went through was a Stewardship; i applied to the Ministry of Natural Resources to work for three months as a ranger at any park within Ontario, Canada. i’m not sure how it works in other provinces (if you’re canadian) or in the states, but i’m pretty sure stewrdship is a big deal in the parks. it’s how they educate youth and get them interested in the line of work. i was sent up north to Kirkland Lake, near the Quebec border (all of our radio stations, count em, THREE, were in french). it’s kettle lake country, and the town is built around a lot of mines (we got to go on a tour of one, it was terrifying). our camp itself was in Esker Lakes park, and i boarded with seventeen other young women and our supervisors, and our beloved cook.
those months were some of the best i’ve ever lived. i made incredible friends through teamwork and soul sharing. we worked together, ate together, slept together. the work itself was hard, but i loved every minute of it. granted, a lot of it was labor. the first two weeks were training; we had to have our first aid/cpr BEFORE even applying, but at camp we took classes on native american rights, bear awareness, emergency evacuation procedures, gps/map usage, learned how to use all of our tools, passed swimming tests, earned our ORCKA certificates (ontario recreational canoeing and kayaking association), and many other things. after that, it was straight to work. we repaired the steps going down to the lake at our camp, built a SAUNA, replaced allllllll of the boardwalks throughout the whole park (it’s very swampy in areas, but it makes great blueberries), cleared trails, and went on on-water patrol to locate illegal boat caches. we even had something called a fisher/marten boil, where a local trapper came by and gave us all of the skulls from his year of trapping fishers and martens. we had to, er, boil the skulls to loosen the teeth, so we could pull said teeth out. doing this helped us determine the animals age, which would be recorded and sent in as a study, to see how many is okay to legally trap the next year. a lot of the work was also working with the park visitors; organizing events and festivals, escorting campers to where they needed to go, things like that. there was def some luxury though, we got to go on a week-long camping trip through our own park, so hiking every day and then bedding down, and then a week-long canoe trip where we canoed outside the park and came back around. i love canoe trips, i went on three while attending highschool, i highly recommend it if you ever get the chance. portaging and living off peanut butter does wonders for character development.
it passed by fast, and ever since, i’ve wanted to continue doing ranger work, but doubts and life got in the way. i’m hoping to go to school so i can start working with the ministry again. the money was good(for my age at the time), but the experience was the real pay off. i’m sure if i become a full-fledged ranger, the work will be that much more difficult and fulfilling. i need to mention, it helped that i had previously worked at two outdoor education centers and gone on canoe trips at school. it looked good on a resume. if you love the outdoors and can see yourself turning that passion into a career, then absoLUTELY try to go for a stewardship if you can. you won’t regret it!
some small tidbits of advice: keep your space clean, bring ducktape for blisters, avoid cooking after sundown while camping, learn how to pack your stuff efficiently and quickly, WEAR WOOL/AVOID COTTON(wool stays warm even while wet), fruity shampoo is your enemy, pack a bear bell/whistle, and KEEP A JOURNAL. i didn’t and i regret it every day. good luck!
