COUNTRY LIFE IN BC • MARCH 2019


Hosting TRU students a way


to give back Ranching family has billeted students every semester


by TOM WALKER WILLIAMS LAKE – Ingrid


and Ty Johnston like kids. They have four children of their own, and Ingrid teaches fiddle to 40 music students, hosts summer fiddle camps and last October she led a group of 12 fiddlers from the Cariboo on an exchange to the Maritimes.


The Johnstons have also been on the board of Thompson Rivers University’s Applied Sustainable Ranching (ASUR) program since its inception. During the four years of the program, they’ve hosted students at their ranch each semester. It’s a way of giving back, they both say, but it also stems from a genuine enthusiasm for the ranching industry, something they share with the other Cariboo families that host students. “Ranching is a driving


passion for us and this is a way to help,” explains Ingrid. Indeed, it is deeply ingrained in the Johnstons’ lives. “Our kids got cows as baby


gifts from their grandparents,” Ingrid chuckles. “But if you didn’t grow up with that, you need the experience.” The Johnstons didn’t start out with the 3,700 acres they own today. “Both Ingrid and I come


from a ranching background,” says Ty. “We wanted to have a career in it, but we took the long way around. I did natural resource sciences and became a forester and Ingrid worked for the Ministry of Agriculture while she developed her music teaching.”


They began homesteading on 350 acres southwest of Horsefly, managing 100 cows of Ty’s father and some of their own. “We were off-grid and had


only a wood stove for heat,” says Ty. “When we were finally able to buy our first land here, a half-hour out of Williams Lake, things were sure a lot easier.”


The property was the historic Onward Ranch, complete with a ranch house, outbuildings and a 107-year- old barn. It’s home to about 300 head, but they could run up to 600. “I think young people can be encouraged by what we have done,” says Ty. “Ingrid and I didn’t inherit a ranch


and the students are able to see what it takes.” They made plenty of


mistakes along the way but they’re happy to share those experiences, too. “I like to share all of my


mistakes,” quips Ty. “Ingrid and I have made a ton of them. If you want some free advice, here it is.” It’s not just a one-way learning channel, Ty emphasizes. “The students are from all


over and they share their experiences,” he says. “They have business views and agriculture views and sustainable ranching views, so it bounces back and forth.” “Our kids get to know them and learn from the students, too,” continues Ingrid. “Our children are three, six, nine and 13 and they tag along with them. The students enrich our lives and make our family bigger.”


The students put in 20 hours a week for room and board, with any extra hours compensated with an agreed- upon wage. But the experience is more important than the work. “I think it’s really important


for the kids to have hands-on. It is real,” explains Ty. “When I went through forestry, some of my profs were real fossils; they had never been in the field.” “If the program were just


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Ingrid and Ty Johnston of Onward Ranch say the TRU students they billet are an extension of their family and a way of sharing their passion for ranching. TRU PHOTO


academics, I think it would be a failure,” adds Ingrid. “Everything you will be working with is outdoors.” Ingrid says the students


follow the seasons with the ranch. Fall finds them riding horses and sorting cows. “One of the girls we had in the fall had only worked on a quad, so she really got to develop her riding skills with us,” she says. “The two young men we are getting next term will be with us during calving season, so we will train them and get them doing day and night checks, tagging and learning the range of calving problems that can happen.” Program coordinator


Gillian Watt says students develop a learning plan at the beginning of the program to help them focus their studies. “They develop a learning


plan for the mentorship portion of the program and


identify which competencies they want to learn,” she explains. “They can then choose the right combination and timing of host ranches to provide those learning experiences.” Watt adds that this takes advantage of the range of agriculture businesses that host the program. “Our community support is


much broader than just ranching,” she points out. “We


have students staying with commercial vegetable producers, sheep ranchers, an operation that uses goats for targeted grazing and mixed farms with poultry, pork and even an abattoir.” “We plan to be with the


program for a while,” says Ingrid. “Our oldest daughter has been able to take part in some of the riding clinics. She is really keen to do something in agriculture sciences.”


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