Schrenck came from a Baltic German family, and was born and raised in the Khotin Manor House [ru], Sumsky Uyezd, Kharkov Governorate.

He received his doctorate from the Imperial University of Dorpat, and then studied natural science in Berlin and Königsberg.

In 1853 Schrenck was sent by the St Petersburg Academy of Sciences to explore the Amurland on board the schooner Vostok.

He published his findings in his Reisen und Forschungen im Amur-Lande in den Jahren 1854-56, in two quarto volumes, 1858–60, with more than 350 pages on birds.

[3] On 10 November, 1879 he was appointed director of the Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography in St Petersburg.