Adolf Schenck (4 April 1857 – 15 September 1936) was a German geographer, mineralogist and
botanist
Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...
who was a native of Siegen. He was a brother to botanist
Heinrich Schenck
Johann Heinrich Rudolf Schenck (31 January 1860 – 25 June 1927) was a German botanist who was a native of Siegen. He was a brother to geographer Adolf Schenck (1857–1936).
Heinrich Schenck initially studied natural sciences at the University ...
(1860-1927).
Schenck studied at the Universities of Berlin and Bonn, obtaining his doctorate in 1884. From 1884 to 1887 he was a geographer on a mineralogical expedition to
German Southwest Africa
German South West Africa (german: Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of the German Empire from 1884 until 1915, though Germany did not officially recognise its loss of this territory until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. With a total area of ...
. The expedition was organized by merchant
Adolf Lüderitz
Franz Adolf Eduard Lüderitz (16 July 1834 – end of October 1886) was a German merchant and the founder of German South West Africa, Imperial Germany's first colony. The coastal town of Lüderitz, located in the ǁKaras Region of southern N ...
(1834-1886) and was under the leadership of Karl Höpfner (1857-1900). Several noted scientists participated in the venture, including Swiss botanist Hans Schinz (1868-1941), who performed botanical investigations in the northern part of German Southwest Africa. In the southern part of the colony, Schenck collected minerals and plants, particularly
lichen
A lichen ( , ) is a composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among filaments of multiple fungi species in a mutualistic relationship.University of Halle, and continued working as a lecturer until 1932. As a teacher he gave lectures on the geography of German colonies.Adolf Schenck Catalogus Professorum Halensis Schenck has a handful of African spermatophyte species named after him.