Backcountry Horsemen of California
The BCHC Internship Committee is pleased to announce that Mathilda Barr of Los Angeles, California, has accepted the 2025 position to train with the U.S. Forest Service
Region 5 Center of Excellence located in the Inyo National Forest. She was the top pick of 25 applicants.
Mathilda is a graduating senior at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She is originally from Los Angeles and grew up camping, skiing, and hiking across
the Eastern Sierra. When she was eight, she decided her favorite way to experience the wilderness was looking down at a trail through a pair of horse (or mule) ears.
This has never changed.
Adventures with horses have taken her to show jumping competitions across Southern California, horse trekking through Mongolia, galloping across beaches in Morocco,
and packing for three summers with Philmont Scout Ranch in the New Mexico Rockies.
Mathilda is incredibly excited to learn and grow as an Intern with the Center of Excellence and the BCHC. We are equally excited to have her in the Intern Program.
(Article by Lucy Badenhoop, BCHC Internship Committee Chair)
Recruitment begins in January at colleges that send student pack teams to Bishop for the annual
Mule Days Celebration packing competition. These students are expected to be highly motivated
with some packing and stock handling skills. Other candidates are also encouraged to apply.
Members of the BCHC Intern Committee, appointed by the BCHC President, will review all
applications submitted by the deadline. Interviews will be conducted and the candidate best
fitting the qualifications will be selected.
With continued experience, BCHC will adjust its funding plan and make necessary changes,
eventually being able to focus on an endowment idea to provide stable long-term funding for the
Intern Program.
For more information about the Intern Program, contact the
BCHC Intern Committee Chair.
Backcountry Horsemen of California and the U.S. Forest Service partnered in 2018 to develop a packing internship program. The program’s mission was “To develop young adults to carry on the skills, attitude and fundamentals of packing, partnerships and LNT for the future of BCH.” Under the supervision of Forest Service Packers Lee Roeser and Michael Morse, the first training took place at Region 5 Pack Stock Center of Excellence to in Bishop, California. Funding to support the program came from various BCHC units combined with a grant from Back Country Horsemen of America. A donation was made to Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps who, in turn, paid the intern.
The mission of the BCHC Intern Program is to recruit and train apprentices that may become the
new generation of highly skilled packers, trail workers, wilderness managers and volunteers that
have a strong desire to protect our public lands, while preserving traditional wilderness skills and
maintaining accessibility.
This is an all-inclusive training program in the use of pack stock as a traditional tool, humane
stock handling and packing procedures. Mule and horsemanship, as well as safety, are the
cornerstones this training is based on. Also included in the program are Leave No Trace
practices for stock users, wilderness management, trail maintenance and all the details that go
into creating a safe, productive and efficient packing operation.
The Packer Intern will develop the skills and knowledge to help perpetuate the common sense
use of horses in America’s backcountry and wilderness and to help work to ensure that public
lands remain open to recreational stock use, whether as an employee of a governmental agency,
or as a private citizen.
Further, the Intern will learn proper use of a crosscut saw and other trail maintenance tools, will
learn/develop the skill of packing, and will educate and encourage wise use of backcountry
resources by all visitors to public lands through Leave No Trace principles. In addition, the
Intern will understand the historical aspect of pack stock use in the backcountry and wilderness
areas as a means for transportation, trail development and other functions and will continue
relationship-building efforts with the Forest Service.
Since inception of the program, funding has been through BCHC unit pledges and individual
donations and only been enough to fund one Intern each year.
In its fifth year of operation (2022), BCHC received its first outside grant for the Intern Program.
Subsequently, Lucy Badenhoop, a BCHC member with years of grant experience for trail
projects, was appointed
Grants Coordinator. Lucy has worked diligently to develop a plan and schedule for long-term funding through grants and 50/50
matching funds (unit pledges).
A pledge schedule was implemented in late 2023 for the 2024 internship cycle. One grant and
sufficient pledges were obtained to fund one Intern in 2024. If additional pledges are received in
time to acquire additional matching grants, multiple Interns could be funded. Any late or unused
funds/grants would roll to the next year.
In 2025, BCHC will pay about $16,400* to support one Intern for the 12-week summer Intern Program. Like
everything else, this amount goes up every year.
A donation to BCHC’s nonprofit 501(c)3 Education Fund, Inc., will help support our education
mission and is tax deductible.
Please give any amount you can to sustain this worthwhile program.
Help us “develop young adults … for the future of BCH.”
(*If donations exceed the amount needed, they will be held in a fund for the next year. Donations to the BCHC Intern Program will only be used for that purpose.)