The group is hiring interns for the year; participants work with wilderness stewardship professionals and backpack into the wild for the hard work of maintaining national forests
By Lee Juillerat for Ashland.news
Looking for a chance to work outdoors in some of the region’s wilderness and backcountry areas?
The Siskiyou Mountain Club, an Ashland-based nonprofit, is hiring interns to serve on the nonprofit’s Wilderness Conservation Corps trail crew for the 2025 season. Over the years interns have come from all over the country. They work directly with stewardship professionals to rebuild trails on national forests throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Crews work remotely in the spring, start work in June, and earn an $1,800 monthly stipend through the summer, said SMC Executive Director Gabriel Howe. “They backpack into remote work sites where crews camp out for up to two weeks sawing logs, clearing brush and digging out trails “lost underneath a 30-year-long divestment from America’s great national forests. A new generation is stepping back in, literally.
Serious commitment
“This program is for anyone who is eager to do the hard work it takes to restore public lands in the 21st century,” Howe said. “SMC crew members are serious about their commitment.”
One of those crew members was 2024 intern Brynn Chambers of Illinois. “It was one of the most challenging experiences of my life,” Chambers said. He applied because he wanted to make meaningful connections with professionals in the field. “Now I’m applying for ranger jobs with different parks.”
Howe said many SMC interns have gone on to pursue careers in natural resources; some stick with the club and are promoted into seasonal staff positions.
Pacific Northwest wild areas
This season, Howe said, crews will work throughout such Pacific Northwest wilderness areas as the Marble Mountain, Sky Lakes, Kalmiopsis and other wild areas. “Sometimes the groups are packed in with horses and mules to lighten the load of 50-plus pound packs that include tools used for trail clearing and maintenance.”
Howe said the club provides accommodations for off-trail days. Those include visits to local destinations like Crater Lake, redwoods and the Oregon Coast. The visits, he explained, “are paired with workshops designed to drive professional development. There is an emphasis on teamwork, and interns live and work undistracted by phones or technology, which they leave behind during work hitches.”
Hard-earned industry credentials
Along with spending about 50 days in the backcountry, Howe said, interns can “accrue a list of industry credentials, and SMC managers help interns build their new skills and experience into new or updated resumes. Some interns build portfolios of writing, photos or video to chronicle their experience.”
Howe emphasized that for interns, “You get what you put into it, and we don’t sugarcoat anything.” Projects are funded through agreements with the U.S. Forest Service, the Oregon Recreational Trails Program, club sponsors and the club’s more than 1,800 members “who support the mission.”
To read the full program description, learn more and apply, visit siskiyoumountainclub.org/wcc2025. To sign up for an informational Zoom call — scheduled on Jan. 30, Feb. 13 and Feb. 27 — email [email protected] or call 458-254-0657.
For a look at the internship experience, watch 2024 intern Joseph Spencer’s five-minute narrated film: “A Drop in a River.” A half-hour film, “A Long Way to Nowhere,” follows a 2023 intern across the Kalmiopsis Wilderness. Or go to the Siskiyou Mountain Club’s YouTube channel, which features “short films from the wilderness,” at youtube.com/@SiskMtnClub.
Email freelance writer Lee Juillerat at [email protected].
