Conservationists, trainers and rangers. Decades of expertise behind every unit we deploy.
Founder & Director, CSIwild
A life-long conservationist and philanthropist, Vianna has a wide range of wildlife experience spanning fieldwork, fundraising, advising, management and start-ups. She is usually to be found in the field with her units, and when not there she travels the world researching new projects, raising the funds to accomplish them, and spreading the word for canines in conservation.
She is a founder member of Peace Parks Club and of WildInvest, and has been involved in various capacities with Tusk Trust, Support for Africa, the Sahara Conservation Fund, AfriCat, The Red Cross, and the Bonobo Conservation Initiative. Between 2021 and 2026 she was a Visiting Scholar in the department of Ecology and Conservation Biology at Texas A&M University.
Founding Director, K9 Conservation
Our Chief of Operations and head trainer, Conraad has twenty-eight years of bush experience behind him. A South African, he began his career as a game ranger in Zululand, became a police reservist in the Special Protected Species Unit, and has specialised for the last twenty-two years in training and working with canine units in the counter-poaching arena.
He leads a formidable team, all with extensive experience working with K9 counter-poaching units, and is committed to providing the highest possible level of training to our students, both human and canine.
Founder & CEO, J&K Canine Academy, USA
One of the most respected detection-dog experts worldwide, Pepe brings thirty years of experience in specialised detection training and canine behaviour. United States based, his passion lies in giving rescue dogs new purpose through meaningful work.
He is among the very few who have successfully trained a turtle-nest detection dog, and is currently training a Kemp's ridley turtle-nest detection dog in Florida for deployment on the coast of Texas.
Ecologist & K9 Handler
An ecologist with a Master's in Wildlife Biology and Conservation, Kiran has decades of experience in wildlife law enforcement. After training to become a dog handler with us at K9 Conservation in South Africa, he spearheaded the establishment of conservation dog units in India and remains CSIwild's head of operations there.
His expertise spans wildlife law enforcement, ecological research and K9 deployment in challenging South Asian terrain.
Founders, GreenTrax
South Africa focused, Ruan and Tina have forty years of combined experience training conservation dogs, with a special interest in Spaniels. Alongside their anti-poaching and contraband-detection dogs, they train canines for narcotics, which are closely linked to the illicit wildlife trade.
They also pioneered incursion detection, in which dogs work along the borders of a reserve, seated on the front of an ATV, detecting human intruders before they can penetrate the perimeter.
Behind every dog stands a team that trained it, and a ranger who trusts it with their life. Your support keeps them in the field.
