Wilderness Magashi Newsletter - March 2023

Magashi lion dynamics

Peace slowly seems to be coming back as M7 and M9 (the younger males looking to take over the area) seem to be on hold from coming onto the concession over the last month. Our Magashi lioness (the Amahoro female) has since made a comeback on the concession with her four cubs. Two of the cubs are confirmed to be female and if they survive could help their mother to restore the pride to a healthy number in the future.

In the last few weeks, Amahoro has spent a lot of time in the northern corner of the concession, where she was spotted feeding on a very large eland bull. For a single lioness to be able to take down such impressive prey is quite astonishing, and the bull provided enough food for her and her offspring for several days.

The resident older males, Ntwari and Ngangare who are the fathers of the cubs, completely lost touch with the Amahoro female for a few weeks. This can only be explained by them not being too vocal, for fear of their challengers making an appearance. They seem to have settled on the southern side of the concession. Our eyes are still peeled to see what happens next and fingers crossed that our healthy-looking cubs continue to grow and flourish.

Three new FGASA-qualified Guides

We are very proud to announce that our three trainee guides have now qualified for their FGASA (Field Guides Association of South Africa) assessments. Former Wilderness Botswana guide trainer, Henry Parsons flew up from South Africa to assess the guides. As this certification is highly regarded in the industry, it adds much value to guests’ Wilderness Magashi guided experience. Rwanda currently has five FGASA-accredited guides, one of whom is the first FGASA-qualified female guide in Rwanda, and all are based at our very own Wilderness Magashi. An incredible achievement for Assiat, Venuste and Herman. We would like to congratulate them on this fantastic achievement.

Meet our newly qualified guides

Herman Nkusi started his guiding career as an Akagera community freelance guide. As his passion for photography and birding grew, seven years later, in 2022, he joined Wilderness Magashi. He is now a FGASA-qualified guide, which was his dream, and he looks forward to achieving more with the Wilderness family.

Assiat Ingabire formerly worked as a community freelance guide in Akagera for three years. She enjoys interacting with guests, interpreting the natural resources of Akagera National Park along with its conservation story and providing an excellent customer experience. Her ambition is to show the younger generation of female guides that high-level guiding for women is possible. She joined Wilderness Magashi as we are a conservation company that can help to achieve her dream. Now she is so proud to be the first female guide to obtain the FGASA certificate in Rwanda.

Venuste Ndungutse started his guiding career in May 2014 as a passionate nature lover and young community freelance field guide in Akagera national park. At the beginning of 2022, he joined Wilderness as a Junior Trainee Guide at Magashi camp. He dreamt of becoming an internationally qualified nature guide one day and finally his dreams came true in March 2023. He is very proud of achieving a FGASA qualification and very thankful to “my company, Wilderness" for making this happen.