In a profession dominated by men for decades, Harriet Birungi made history when she became the first woman to qualify as a certified gorilla tracker in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park. Her story is one of persistence, passion, and the quiet transformation of a conservation sector that had long overlooked the women who lived closest to the gorillas. In 2027, Harriet leads tracking expeditions for the Nshongi gorilla family in the Rushaga sector and has mentored seven other women who have since joined the tracking corps. This is her story.
Growing Up on the Forest Edge
Harriet was born in 1987 in a village three kilometres from Bwindi’s southern boundary. Her childhood was shaped by the forest in contradictory ways. As a small child, she was told to fear the gorillas — large, powerful animals that occasionally moved through community farms and damaged crops. But she was also fascinated by them. She spent hours watching from safe distances as family groups moved along the forest edge, observing behaviour that most visitors to Bwindi never see because it happens outside the formal trekking areas.
When gorilla trekking tourism began growing in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Harriet watched men from her community get jobs as rangers, trackers, and porters. No women were recruited. When she asked why, she was told that the terrain was too difficult and the work too physical. She did not accept that answer.
The Path to Becoming a Tracker
In 2008, the Uganda Wildlife Authority opened a community ranger training programme that, for the first time, did not explicitly exclude women from applying. Harriet was 21 years old and working as a schoolteacher. She applied, was shortlisted, and was one of only three women in a cohort of 24 trainees.
The training was physically demanding — weeks of hiking through dense terrain, learning gorilla tracking techniques, studying gorilla behaviour, and passing safety protocols for close-proximity wildlife encounters. Two of the three women dropped out before the end. Harriet completed every element and graduated top of her cohort in navigation and gorilla behaviour assessment.
Her first years as a ranger were not without friction. Some senior male rangers were skeptical of her abilities. Some early clients requested a “male guide” without knowing she was their assigned tracker. She answered both through performance. By 2012 she was leading treks independently. By 2015 she had the highest client satisfaction ratings of any tracker in the Rushaga sector.
What Makes Harriet’s Style of Guiding Different
Travellers who trek with Harriet often describe her style as unusually communicative and emotionally attuned. She connects the gorilla families’ stories to the human stories of the communities around them. She speaks about individual gorillas — their births, their relationships, their conflicts — with a warmth that comes from years of observing the same families through every life stage. She also pays close attention to the emotional responses of her trekking groups, recognising when someone is overwhelmed and giving them space to experience the encounter in their own way without pressure or performance.
“I grew up alongside these gorillas,” she told a journalist in 2026. “They are not strange or exotic to me the way they are to visitors. They are my neighbours. When I guide, I am introducing visitors to my neighbours. That changes how you talk about them.”
Mentoring the Next Generation of Female Trackers
Since 2019, Harriet has formally mentored women entering the UWA tracking programme. She advocates within the UWA system for recruitment policies that actively encourage female applicants and has worked with conservation NGOs to fund bursaries for women from forest-edge communities to access guide training.
Seven women she has mentored are now working as certified trackers in Bwindi. Two of them work with us directly. The transformation in the gender composition of the tracking corps is slow, but it is happening — and Harriet is the person most responsible for it in the Rushaga sector.
Why Her Story Matters Beyond Tourism
Harriet’s story is a conservation story as much as it is a gender equality story. Research consistently shows that communities with greater female participation in conservation decision-making have better biodiversity outcomes. Women in forest-edge communities often have more granular knowledge of forest-boundary dynamics, crop-raiding patterns, and community attitudes toward wildlife than their male counterparts — knowledge that is invaluable for conservation planning.
When you trek gorillas in Uganda in 2027, there is a chance your tracker will be a woman. If that tracker is in the Rushaga sector, she may have been trained by Harriet. And regardless of who leads your trek, the presence of women in the tracking corps is part of a conservation ecosystem that is stronger for their inclusion.
