) is a conservationist and wildlife photographer who has spent most of his career in the Congo basin

Congo Basin

The Congo Basin is the sedimentary basin that is the drainage of the Congo River of west equatorial Africa. The basin begins in the highlands of the East African Rift system with input from the Chambeshi River, the Uele and Ubangi Rivers in the upper reaches and the Lualaba River draining wetlands...

.

Ammann started his career in Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

 as a photographer in the early 1980s, photographing cheetah

Cheetah

The cheetah is a large-sized feline inhabiting most of Africa and parts of the Middle East. The cheetah is the only extant member of the genus Acinonyx, most notable for modifications in the species' paws...

s, but later turned to work on great apes. In 1988, he became witness to the bushmeat

Bushmeat

Bushmeat initially referred to the hunting of wild animals in West and Central Africa and is a calque from the French viande de brousse. Today the term is commonly used for meat of terrestrial wild animals, killed for subsistence or commercial purposes throughout the humid tropics of the Americas,...

 trade, and has since worked hard to bring the trade and its effect (particularly on great apes) to the attention of the conservation community and the world. Using his photography skills, he has taken pictures of the victims of the bushmeat trade that to many where shocking and revolting, and he has been accused of exaggerating the problems. With the publishing of the books Eating Apes (with Dale Peterson

Dale Peterson

Dale Peterson is an American author who writes about scientific and natural history subjects.-Early Life and Education:...

) and Consuming Nature, the problem has come to the attention of the world.

In his years working in Congo, Ammann has funded and supported research of another population of extremely large bodied Eastern chimpanzee

Eastern Chimpanzee

The eastern chimpanzee is a subspecies of the common chimpanzee. It occurs in the Central African Republic, the Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and Tanzania....

 now known as the Bili Ape

Bili Ape

Bili Ape, also Bondo Mystery Ape, is the name given to a large chimpanzee that inhabits Bili Forest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo....

. Though it has been studied by prominent researchers, much remains to be discovered about its distribution and behavior. Because it is currently hunted as part of the DRC's bushmeat

Bushmeat

Bushmeat initially referred to the hunting of wild animals in West and Central Africa and is a calque from the French viande de brousse. Today the term is commonly used for meat of terrestrial wild animals, killed for subsistence or commercial purposes throughout the humid tropics of the Americas,...

 trade it is vital to continue research in this area before this population is eliminated

Karl Ammann appeared on Time Magazine's list of "Heroes of the Environment

Heroes of the Environment

Heroes of the Environment is a list published in Time Magazine. The inaugural list was published in October 2007. The list contains 43 entries, individuals or groups that have contributed substantially to the preservation of environment, and is divided into four categories: Leaders & Visionaries,...

" October 2007.

External links

• Karl Ammann - website
• Bushmeat Crisis Task Force site