FWP Veteran Tom Flowers New Region 6 Supervisor

Tom Flowers, a 25-year veteran of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, has been named as the agency’s new Region 6 supervisor.

In his new position, Flowers, 54, will supervise about 40 full-time employees in an administrative area that spans from the North Dakota and Saskatchewan borders to Sidney, Circle and Loma, and the Liberty County line west of Havre.

The sprawling and diverse Region includes a wide variety of fish and wildlife habitats, the Missouri River and Fort Peck Reservoir, and the Fort Peck, Fort Belknap and Rocky Boy Indian reservations. Flowers most recently served as FWP Region 4’s criminal investigator, a post he held since 2008 in the Rocky Mountain Front community of Choteau.

Flowers is a native of Clovis, N.M. Being in an Air Force family resulted in being raised in a variety of places ranging from Taiwan to North Carolina. He studied at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C., before transferring to the University of Montana in Missoula in 1977. At UM, he studied botany and philosophy and graduated in 1981.

Once out of college, Flowers started outfitting in the Bob Marshall and Scapegoat wilderness areas with the Ovando-based Sundance Ranch. He then worked four years in some of the same backcountry areas for legendary Missoula-based outfitter Arnold “Smoke” Elser.

Flowers started with FWP as a warden in Miles City in 1988. He then became the agency’s first resident warden in Jordan before being transferred to Shelby,

where he served as an area warden until 1993. He then was the area warden in Choteau before being promoted to the regional investigator position.

Flowers and his wife, Lisa, have been married for 30 years and have a daughter, Anne, 24, a recent theater and biology graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University.

Lisa Flowers holds a master’s degree in science teaching and a doctorate in conservation education from UM-Missoula. She currently works for the Montana State University Foundation and previously was the longtime research and education program director for the Boone & Crockett Club’s Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch outside Dupuyer.

Flowers replaces Pat Gunderson as the Region 6 supervisor. Gunderson moved to the federal Bureau of Land Management office in Glasgow late last year.

“I’m excited about being here and having new challenges,” Flowers said. “Members of the public should come on by our office and say hello.”