Wilhelm Heering

Wilhelm Christian August Heering (born September 6, 1876 in Altona ; † May 26, 1916 in front of Verdun ) was a German senior teacher , botanist and conservationist . His botanical author abbreviation is " Heering ".

Live and act

Wilhelm Heering was the son of Carl Heering and his wife Amalie, nee Zachau. His father worked as a machinist. After graduating from secondary school in 1895, he studied natural sciences at the University of Munich , the University of Halle and the University of Kiel . In his dissertation in 1899 he wrote about the assimilation organs of the genus Baccharis . From 1895 on, Heering rearranged a herbarium in Hamburg. The collection was maintained by the pharmacist Johann Jacob Meyer from 1812 to 1834, but was then forgotten. Heering expanded the collection into a core piece of the Altona Museum . The herbarium is now kept at the Institute for Botany at the University of Hamburg .

From 1902 Heering taught at a secondary school in Altona-Ottensen . The senior teacher wrote instructions for his students on scientific observations in the area around Altona . It was a remarkable typeface that appeared in the 1905 annual report of the Realschule and was based on local history. Since 1899, Heering has focused on research into freshwater algae. He informed about a variety of different algae in the Eppendorfer Moor . The work appeared in 1904 in the negotiations of the Natural Science Association in Hamburg . In 1903 the Natural Science Association for Schleswig-Holstein was looking for an author who, based on the model of Hugo Conwentz, was to create a work on Schleswig-Holstein similar to the forest botanical booklet . Heering took over the work on the book, which took 18 months to complete. For this purpose he recorded unspoilt bushes and trees that are worth preserving. Heering stated that during this time he had traveled almost 7,000 kilometers by train and 3,000 kilometers on foot. In 1906 both the book by Conwentz and the book Trees and Bushes in Schleswig-Holstein by Heering were published. Heering's work was much more extensive and also contained explanations about trees in the Hamburg city area.

In 1908 Heering wrote the guideline for biological teaching , in 1910/11 the guideline for scientific teaching , which comprised two volumes. Both textbooks were intended for teaching in high schools. From 1909, Heering headed the business of the Schleswig-Holstein Provincial Office for Natural Monument Preservation. In 1911 he received a call from the Hamburg State Botanical Institute, where he also gave lectures at the Colonial Institute as a research assistant . In 1911 and 1914 he published together with Clemens Grimme on pasture conditions and forage plants in German South West Africa . The background to the investigations was probably colonial economic goals. In December 1915 the conference for the preservation of natural monuments took place. Heering wanted to explain in a lecture why moorland protection areas should be established in Schleswig-Holstein. However, he was unable to attend the conference due to a draft notice he had received shortly before.

Wilhelm Heering died as a deputy officer in France during the First World War .

literature

• Hans Walden: Heering, Wilhelm . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 2 . Christians, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 3-7672-1366-4 , pp. 180-170 .

Web links

• Author entry and list of the described plant names for Wilhelm Heering at the IPNI