Research Group

Ali has worked with our research group for over 10 years. He is the consummate natural historian, with encyclopedic knowledge of darned near every critter--flora and fauna--on the UHURU project. Ali is absolutely essential to keeping our projects in Laikipia running smoothly while we're across the pond.

Wandering about downtown Cordoba, Argentina in 2007, I realized it had me: Nature Deficit Disorder. I needed to get out and into the mountains, into fresh air. I packed my backpack, locked my apartment, and headed to Patagonia for a few days. Here, it finally became obvious what career was calling me, and what I needed to do.

I was born and grew up in a small village in Keiyo District, Kenya, where I spent a lot of time tending livestock and fetching firewood in the bush. My interaction with nature and wild creatures during my childhood provided a source of wonder and inspiration toward the environment.

I am a lucky fellow because I get paid to do what I love to do. I am an academic generalist and I try hard to be a conservation biologist, community ecologist, and mammalogist simultaneously. I am interested in both applied issues and basic questions in ecology. Through my research and that of our group, I try to understand how species interactions can inform wildlife conservation and management.

I am working toward my MSc in Wildlife Management at Moi University in Kenya, coadvised by Jake Goheen and Mordecai Ogada of the Laikipia Wildlife Forum. I am collaborating closely with Adam Ford to understand how the perceived risk of predation affects diet selectivity of impala, a mixed-feeder abundant throughout Laikipia.