Washington Wachira

Washington Wachira is a Nairobi-based ornithologist, ecologist, and tour leader who has been guiding birding trips across East Africa since 2010. He holds a BSc in Environmental Science and an MSc in Animal Ecology from Kenyatta University, is a member of the Kenya Professional Safari Guides Association, and is a National Geographic Explorer for his long-running research on the African Crowned Eagle. His institutional footprint is unusually deep for a working guide: he has served as manager of the Kenya Bird Map Project, as chairperson of the Kenya Herpetofauna Working Group, and currently chairs the East Africa Rarities Committee. He founded the Kenyatta University Birding Club in 2014 and the Youth Conservation Awareness Programme to bring young Kenyans into field ornithology, and he gave a 2017 TED Talk titled "For the love of birds." In 2022 he set an East African big-year record by recording more than 1,000 bird species in twelve months across the region. Wachira leads scheduled and private tours for Cisticola Tours, the Nairobi-based company he founded, with a focus on Kenya's endemics and near-endemics — Sokoke Pipit and Clarke's Weaver on the coast, Hinde's Babbler around Mount Kenya — alongside regional megaticks like Shoebill in Uganda and Green-breasted Pitta in the Albertine Rift forests. He is particularly known for cisticolas and other cryptic species other guides skip.