Retired forester Ken Hires finds calling in national parks

Ken Hires is living large in the great outdoors, satisfying his equal enjoyment of nature, wildlife and people.

Since retiring from the Washington Department of Natural Resources in 2000, Hires has hopped around from the Sonoran Desert to the High Sierra as an interpretive ranger for the National Park Service.

“I haven’t been home very long in recent years before taking off to another position,” he said.

A forestry career that groomed his naturalist and supervisory skills made him instantly desirable to parks looking for seasonal employees who interact with park visitors.

National park rangers have a brief opportunity in an ideal classroom to inform the public about important natural resources, Hires said.

During his 28 years with DNR, Hires headed the statewide Timber, Fish and Wildlife Program. Tourists are easy to handle after years of bridging industry with agencies and recreational interests.

Hires, 70, relishes the job of teaching natural history, as one could see tagging along on a ranger walk he led at his current post with North Cascades National Park. He’s stationed at Stehekin, virtually surrounded by wilderness, at the end of 55-mile-long Lake Chelan.

“In Washington, 57 species of creatures depend on holes in tree snags,” he said, pointing to what could have been a woodpecker nest cavity.

He was ushering a group of eight visitors, young and old, through a brief introduction of the area’s trees and shrubs.

“This is one of my favorites, the Scouler’s Willow,” he said bending down a branch for all to examine. With the enthusiasm of a preacher in need of offerings to build a church, Hires explained how the willow grows fast, produces large quantities of nutritional forage used by a wide variety of wildlife from beavers to bear.

“And the bark has the same chemical as aspirin,” he said, noting that humans have used it medicinally as a pain reliever, anti-inflammatory, astringent and diuretic.

A large-leaf maple was worth a stop. “It takes 50 gallons of sap for one gallon of syrup,” he said.

As the group strolled toward the end of the ranger tour, Hires dipped into his pool of knowledge to answer questions.

“Yes, black bears are around here,” he said. “Did you know that only 27 percent of black bears are black?”

After he retired from the state, Hires was freelance writing when he heard about a summer interpretive position with the Forest Service at Mount St. Helens Volcanic National Monument.

“My first job with the DNR was based out of Cougar. I knew the area. They hired me and I fell in love with being a ranger.”

With a few years of interpretive experience on his post-retirement resume, Yellowstone National Park offered Hires the job of lead interpretive ranger for the winter season.

“That was a dream of mine, to be in Yellowstone in winter, and to get paid for it,” he said.

“I told my wife about the job after I said yes.”

His wife, Sharon, has continued to keep up their base in Spokane and work at West Valley High School, but she frequently joins her husband at his scenic locations, whether he’s staying in a travel trailer, cabin or park-owned house.

“I had to ride a snowmobile 50 miles to see him when he worked in Yellowstone,” she said.

Hires later found a position in Kings Canyon National Park in the Sierra Nevada Range of California, where he bunked in the two-room log cabin built at 6,700 feet for the original ranger.

“The trails are incredibly scenic at that elevation, and significantly steep,” he recalled.

He balanced those stints of oxygen deprivation with seasonal jobs at Organ Pike Cactus National Monument in Arizona.

“I’ve been able to stay on the move and work in the most beautiful places on earth,” he said. “I’m healthy because I’m happy.”

Four years ago, he lined up a job at Stehekin, where, relatively speaking, he’s planted roots.

“They call it a permanent position,” he chuckled. “Nobody’s permanent, but this is pretty cool.”

This year he’s the Stehekin District supervisory interpreter in charge of a staff of about six volunteers and rangers.

He relishes free time to focus his camera on the scenery and animals. But there’s often a meeting to attend or a task to do.

“I work 80 hours every two weeks, but it’s not an 8-to-5 job,” he said. “If something comes up at an outpost like Stehekin, you have to take care of it.”

A job at Stehekin, which is accessible only by float plane or a 55-mile boat ride from the city of Chelan, is a privilege, he said.

“It’s funny: Sharon could leave from Spokane airport and get to where I was stationed in Organ Pipe on the Mexico border faster than she can leave Spokane and get to Stehekin,” he said.

“The ferry ride is awesome the first 15 times you take it,” she said, smiling.

“But being on this lake and having this house – what a deal,” Hires said looking out their Park Service housing window overlooking the lake.