Vickie joined the team in April 2018 as Seabird Ecologist to study the islands' internationally important seabirds; Vickie works part time for part of the year (when the majority of our seabirds are here!)

I’ve been coming to Scilly on camping holidays since I was a child and made the move full time to the islands in 2004. I have a PhD on seabirds and have been involved in counting them in Scilly since the nationwide survey of Seabird 2000.

Each year I have a summer contract to track the fortunes of our internationally important seabirds, to see where and how many eggs they lay and how many chicks they fledge from them. My job as Seabird Ecologist for the Trust allows me restricted access to some of the more remote rocks and islands which is a real privilege.

At the Trust we are working in collaboration with other conservation bodies to make sure we do the best we can to protect our seabirds and maintain or enhance the habitat available to them across the islands. In particular I have been involved from the start in the Seabird Recovery Project to remove invasive rats from St Agnes and Gugh. It has been fabulous to monitor the increasing success of the burrow nesting Manx shearwaters and storm petrels there since rat-free status was achieved, and to support the community in their efforts to keep it that way.

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I love: Seabirds (no brainer really) - oh, and Duran Duran

I hate: Jazz and garlic

My favourite place in Scilly: Peninnis

The animal I would most like to see in the wild: Coconut crab