Background
Von Flotow was born in the village of Pitzerwitz (Pstrowice in Polish) in the region of Neumark.
Botanist lichenologist mycologist
Von Flotow was born in the village of Pitzerwitz (Pstrowice in Polish) in the region of Neumark.
In 1813, he suffered a serious war injury at the Battle of Lützen, from which he never fully recovered and which led to a partial paralysis of his right arm. During a military campaign in France (1819), he took the opportunity to study lichens native to the Ardennes Mountains. In 1832 he took an early retirement from the military and worked as a private scholar in Hirschberg.
Among his written works are the following:
Reisebericht über eine Excursion nach einem Theile des südöstlichen Riesengebirges (1836)
Über Haematococcus Pluvialis (1844)
Lichenes Florae Silesiae (1849-1850)
The genus Flotovia from the botanical family Asteraceae is named in his honor.
Von Flotow was a member of several learned societies, notably the Leopoldina and the Senckenberg Nature Research Society.