Vickie Edwards

Conservation Director

Vickie joined the Preservation Trust as Conservation Director in November 2020, after working in the natural-resources field in western Montana for 20 years—most recently at Five Valleys Land Trust in Missoula.

Prior to six years of serving in various conservation and stewardship capacities at Five Valleys, Vickie worked for the state of Montana as a wildlife biologist, implementing wildlife management and land conservation programs over 1.8 million acres in the Missoula area.

Her previous work included monitoring and studying mountain lions, building working relationships with landowners to gain access to private lands to conduct research.

Working for the USDA Forest Service and U.S. Geological Survey, she supervised 30 crew members and managed logistics for a million-acre study area in the Blackfoot River drainage on private and public lands to obtain a population estimate on grizzly bears.

Vickie also served as a Wildlife Conflict Specialist, responding to emergency calls involving conflicts between humans and bears, mountain lions, moose, and assorted other big-game species.

But Vickie wasn’t always a Montana girl. She acquired her love of nature while living in south Florida, where she spent as much time as possible on the water fishing, kayaking, and viewing wildlife. Her studies at the University of South Florida focused on human impacts on avian species, particularly on spoil islands in the intracoastal waterways of the Gulf of Mexico.

Now that she lives on San Juan Island, she has developed an equally strong fascination with orcas, harbor seals, bald eagles, trumpeter swans, and all the other wildlife and plant species—as well as the people—that make these islands such an amazing and conservation-worthy place in the world.