He studied medicine in Tübingen, Zurich, Bern, Prague and Vienna, obtaining his doctorate in medicine and surgery in 1852.
Afterwards, he worked as a physician in his hometown of Chur and as a balneologist in Tarasp.
He was long-time president of the Naturforschenden Gesellschaft Graubündens (1859–1891) and also served as vice-president of the Historisch-Antiquarischen Gesellschaft Graubündens.
[1][2] He was the author of several works on bryophytes native to the canton of Graubünden, and in the field of entomology, he was principal author of the five-volume "Beiträge zu einem Verzeichnisse der Insectenfauna Graubündens".
[3] His studies on the mineral waters at Tarasp were later translated into English and published as "Tarasp and its mineral waters" (Nettleton Balme Whitby; publisher: London: Bosworth, 1870).