ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia — Bend resident Ed Ochs always hated poachers. When he was a boy, growing up on a ranch outside Madras in the 1970s, deer and elk poachers were constantly trespassing on his family’s property. Ochs and his father spent much of their time chasing them away.

So when Ochs saw a TV news clip about Rally for Rangers — a project in Mongolia that helps national park rangers fend off poachers — he was all in.

“The show said poachers were killing snow leopards up in Mongolia, and I was like, I can’t stand poachers, I love snow leopards. I thought I want to do this,” said Ochs, 62, a wind turbine technician.

The Rally for Rangers charity rally is run by the Mongol Ecology Center, an environmental nonprofit based in the Mongolian capital, Ulaanbaatar. Participants who want to join are required to raise funds to buy a motorbike for the trip, and at the end of the ride, give the bike away to a local park ranger. They must ride across Mongolia’s vast deserts and steppes to reach the park where the bikes are being donated.

The rangers use the motorbikes to patrol Mongolia’s national parks, frequently traveling over rough terrain to chase off wildlife poachers and illegal miners. National parks in Mongolia are largely devoid of paved roads and often the only way to get around is by horse, motorbike, jeep or on foot.

Ochs arrived in the Mongolian capital this week, where he joined up with 14 other rally participants. At the Mongol Ecology Center earlier this week Ochs was all smiles as he studied a wall map of Mongolia and learned about some of the sights he’ll pass during the ride.

“They say it’s going to be more technical than previous rides. I like that. I am looking forward to diverse terrain and diverse riding conditions,” he said. “Hopefully, the weather will be pretty good. I can’t wait to get on the road.”

The starting point for the trip is southern Mongolia, 335 miles from the capital. The participants will cover an estimated 900 miles of open road to the tiny village of Ulaan Uul where they will donate their new bikes to the park rangers. Participants can also gift the rangers something from home. Ochs plans to give a Leatherman multitool to the ranger who will also be accepting his motorbike.

As is tradition, the rangers will be acknowledging the gift by adorning the participants with a blue silk scarf, known as a hadakh.

Ochs paid a starting fee of $10,750 to join the rally. That cost includes the price of the Yamaha AG200 motorbike, along with costs associated with the trip — guides, domestic flights, meals, hotels, yurt camps and other fees. The flight to Mongolia and the riding equipment sent the price of the ride even higher.

A GoFundMe page has so far raised over $5,000 to help defray costs. He’s also gotten help from Pro Caliber Motorsports in Bend, which discounted the price of the riding equipment he needs for the rugged journey.

“It’s kind of a challenge to raise all the money, so even if I have to pay for this out of my own pocket I am going to do it anyway because it’s for a good cause and I think it’s going to be a heck of a lot of fun,” he said.

The journey promises to be a rough one. Mongolia is six times larger than Oregon but has a population of just 3 million people, about half of them living in the capital. The rest of the country is rugged open steppe and desert, with a few narrow bands of forest close to Russia.

The rally route has few paved roads and only the rare gas station so a support vehicle carrying cans of gas will travel behind the group.

Ochs has ridden dirt bikes and motorcycles since a young age and recently competed in a few “hard scrambles” (a form of off-road racing that varies in time and distance). He says he is up for the challenge but does worry about the potential for a crash.

“I don’t want to cause others to have a bad trip because of me. I don’t want to screw up,” he said.

Apart from those nerves, Ochs said he is looking forward to the journey and is proud to know that the bikes will be used by rangers to fend off poaching. As a youth Ochs patrolled the family ranch in a truck while his father flew above in a light plane, calling out the poacher positions on a CB radio.

“We were constantly fighting with poachers coming on our land and shooting deer and elk,” he said.

Poaching has long been a problem in Mongolia as well. Snow leopards, bears, falcons, musk deer, argali sheep and other wildlife are illegally hunted or trapped. Russian hunters who sneak over the border are the usual culprits in the Ulaan Taiga National Park, where the rally is going this year. Illegal gold mining has also been a problem in some parks.

“When we gave them bikes in 2015, it really cut down on the poaching. It almost eliminated it,” said Wesley Thornburg, one of the trip’s organizers. “So we want to make sure they still have those vehicles.”

Thornburg says due to the rough terrain the motorbikes have a limited lifespan and need to be replaced every few years. Older bikes are used for spare parts or make their way to other parks.

The idea for the motorbike rally formed in 2013 when a U.S. National Park Service ranger, Robert “Mac” McIntosh, a volunteer with the Mongol Ecology Center, was helping rangers at Lake Khovsgol National Park close to the Russian border.

McIntosh watched helplessly one day when a park ranger couldn’t go out on a call because his bike broke down. It was a common problem, the park rangers told McIntosh.

McIntosh later went back to Ulaanbaatar, bought a brand new motorbike, and drove it across the country to give it to the ranger.

Staff at the Mongol Ecology Center hatched a plan to do similar motorbike rallies involving more people from overseas. The Rally for Rangers concept has since spread to other countries, including Nepal, Bhutan and Peru, where similar problems in national parks were identified. Thornburg notes that the Mongol Ecology Center is the only nonprofit in Mongolia that also works in other countries.

Khongoryn Els (Singing Sand Dunes), Tost National Park (home to snow leopards), and the sacred Otgontenger Mountain are a few places Ochs will pass on the journey. Temperatures in the Gobi Desert are expected to climb into the 80s but further north, the nighttime temperatures are forecast to dip below freezing next week. Participants will be camping each night along the way.

“There will be sand riding in the desert, water crossings, steep and rocky terrain,” Ochs said. “It will be hot in the Gobi and then cold in the mountains, possibly riding in the rain. It could be tricky.”

But Ochs thinks the challenge of the overland journey and the chance to help the park rangers is worth the effort.

“I am really excited for the ride,” he said. “And I am also excited to hand off the bike over to the park ranger.”