The Ranch is one of many Buildings that can be placed in the Apprentice's Towns. It's the largest building (by area it takes up), and it is composed of an open corral enclosed by a wooden split-rail fence. There's a large barn in the back, with an attached silo and hen house, all of which start out red, but none of which have accessible interiors. There is nothing for the Apprentice to purchase in the Ranch, and only a couple of active hotspots that generate humourous messages.
The Ranch can have up to four Residents as workers, but only one slot is unlocked at first. The Ranch is not available at the start and the blueprint must be unlocked by building 3 Community Gardens and befriending 3 Critters.
The Ranch can be customised in a number of ways. The roof, walls and skirting can each be painted with various Wallpapers. In the second screenshot in the infobox, the roof is red, the walls are green and the skirting is blue. (Note that the buildings start out a slightly different shade of red than if the red Wallpaper is used). There are four Token slots to fill to modify other building properties.
The Ranch has a special purpose, and that is to serve as another display area for adopted Critters. To add a Critter to a staffed Ranch, the Apprentice must go to any Nature Reserve and select the "Manage Critters" option, then cancel twice to get to the District selection menu, from which the Apprentice can choose the District with the Ranch in it and add up to one large and one small Critter.