{"id":27983,"date":"2025-04-29T18:37:21","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T18:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wildsalmoncenter.org\/?p=27983"},"modified":"2025-10-13T16:07:49","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T16:07:49","slug":"meet-dr-saulyegul-avlyush","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wildsalmoncenter.org\/2025\/04\/29\/meet-dr-saulyegul-avlyush\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Wild Salmon Center\u2019s new Senior Mongolia Consultant is building momentum to protect wild fish\u2014including the world\u2019s largest salmonid\u2014across her nation.<\/h2>\n\n\n
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Wild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush was nearly 13 years old when she received her current first name, Saulyegul, replacing Tuyatsetseg, the Mongolian name she\u2019d been given at birth. Her parents, members of Mongolia\u2019s ethnic Kazakh minority, had relocated the family to Ulaanbaatar to secure an urban education for their children. In Mongolia’s capital city, where Kazakh heritage was more rare, Dr. Avlyush\u2019s parents wanted their children to draw strength from their roots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was a new name, new city, new school,\u201d says Dr. Avlyush.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, she recognizes that this time offered early lessons in adapting to change\u2014even embracing it. When her dream of becoming a medical doctor faltered, she pivoted to teaching. Then, near the conclusion of her undergraduate education, her path forked again. Dr. Avlyush adapted\u2014we\u2019d even say thrived.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Wild Salmon Center\u2019s new Senior Mongolia Consultant reflects on the path that\u2019s taken her to remote rivers like the \u00dc\u00fcr, Kharaa, and Delgermurun\u2014and to an unexpected career as an ecologist, biologist, and researcher focused on aquatic species like Siberian taimen<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI never planned it, but I\u2019m really happy with my life,\u201d she says. \u201cThis work has been the door to a larger world.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Below, we talk with Dr. Avlyush about detours, role models, and the historic meeting that she hopes will help shape Mongolia\u2019s freshwater story for years to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This work has been the door to a larger world.<\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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Wild Salmon Center: You started your professional life planning to teach secondary school. How did you instead become a world-traveling research scientist?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush:<\/em><\/strong> In 2003, I\u2019d graduated from university with a thesis in microbiology. I was looking for positions as a biology teacher, at my parents\u2019 suggestion. Time was running out. Mongolian schools all start in the beginning of September, and I hadn\u2019t received any offers.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe a week before the school term started, a professor called to tell me about some German scientists who were travelling to an area in Northern Mongolia known for gold mining. They were going for one week to do freshwater ecology training in the Yer\u00fc\u00fc River. My professor said, this would be good training for you. So I packed my sleeping bag, my backpack, and I went to this area for the first time. It was wild, and green, and for the first time I met foreign people. I was so shy! I would only tell them my name. But it was an amazing week. I changed course completely. I wanted to be a scientist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I packed my sleeping bag, my backpack, and I went to this area for the first time. It was wild and green. I changed course completely. I wanted to be a scientist.<\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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A Mongolian river. (PC: Mike Greener.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Back in Ulaanbaatar, I started looking for positions with the Institute of Geoecology  [part of the Mongolia Academy of Sciences]. I asked for an appointment with the director. I was so young, without any experience, and there weren\u2019t any positions. For two months, I kept showing up to try to meet with him, and he never had time. By the end, though, his secretary knew me so well, and ultimately I got the meeting. He gave me a chance to work as a junior water researcher in the Land Division, and then one month later I got a position in freshwater ecology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What was it about freshwater ecology that called to you so strongly?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In part, it\u2019s the pristine places this work takes me to. And it\u2019s also the people. This work is a door to the world. Over the years, I\u2019ve met so many scientists from across the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One is Dr. Bud Mendsaikhan [of the Institute of Geoecology and Geography]. Dr. Mendee was a role model for me. Early on, I was working in the hydrochemistry lab, and she took me on my first professional field training, to a lake in March\u2014when it\u2019s freezing. We arrived so early in the morning. Dr. Mendee had just one backpack and a cup of tea, and by 6 a.m. she was working. Such energy, this lady! There were two gers<\/em> [traditional portable Mongolian dwellings] by this lake, and one was full of Chinese fishermen. They were catching fish, and Dr. Mendee started measuring the fish lengths, their weights. She had this amazing memory. I remember how she walked, how she communicated with these fishermen. I wanted to be just like her.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s the pristine places this work takes me to. And it\u2019s also the people. Over the years, I\u2019ve met so many scientists from across the world. <\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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On the banks of Oregon’s Wood River: Wild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush (left, facing forward) and Dr. Bud Mendsaikhan of Mongolian’s Institute of Geoecology and Geography. Both scientists have long collaborated on freshwater ecology research in Mongolia. In October 2024, both traveled to the United States for a knowledge exchange<\/a> focused on salmonid recovery efforts in the Klamath Basin. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Freshwater ecology helps you see how we impact the land and water. In one place I visited in Northern Mongolia, it was so pristine, but just 20 kilometers away there was a gold mine. We could see that the impacts of both that and livestock overgrazing were reaching this river system. We have so many megaprojects<\/a> now that our scientific work has become very important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In one place I visited in Northern Mongolia, we could see the impacts of both mining and livestock overgrazing. We have so many megaprojects now that our scientific work has become very important.<\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Horses, camels and other animals fill key transportation needs in Mongolia, and livestock are critical to the national economy. Throughout Mongolia, many herds roam freely: movement that does carry some risks for wild fish in the rivers they cross. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Where has your career taken you since those early days?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to continuing my career at the Institute of Geoecology and Geography, I\u2019ve worked at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ), and I was part of the 2030 Water Resources Group hosted by the World Bank and Millennium Challenge Account in Mongolia. I\u2019ve worked with German and Australian scientists on taimen migration and movement, as well as on heavy metal exposure and contamination among fish fauna.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why did you join the Wild Salmon Center team? How can an international group help advance wild fish conservation in Mongolia?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Freshwater ecology is kind of a missing field of study in Mongolia. There is Dr. Mendee and a few other leading researchers at Mongolian Academy of Sciences. The Institute of Biology [also part of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences] has a Hydrobiology and Ichthyology Laboratory and perhaps five or six scientists. And not a lot of international organizations are here that specialize in working with fish. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Wild Salmon Center has 30 years of experience already doing this in Russia and in North America. So when I learned that WSC was looking to help build a team here, I thought, this is a good opportunity for me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Freshwater ecology is kind of a missing field of study in Mongolia. Not a lot of international organizations are here that specialize in working with fish. But Wild Salmon Center has 30 years of experience doing this in Russia and in North America.<\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Wild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush, center, with Mongolian and American scientists<\/a> on a 2024 tour of the Klamath Basin on the Oregon-California border. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Wild Salmon Center has a long term vision for conservation, and the capacity to help build local leadership. Both are very important here. It also has the International Taimen Initiative<\/a>, which is bringing even more scientific expertise and knowledge exchange to Mongolia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wild Salmon Center has a long term vision for conservation, and the capacity to help build local leadership. Both are very important here. <\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Dr. Bud Mendsaikhan of Mongolia’s Institute of Geoecology and Geography (left) and Wild Salmon Center Science Director Dr. Matthew Sloat with a Siberian taimen in Mongolia. (PC: Wild Salmon Center.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

What would you like people outside of Mongolia to understand about the work that you do with Wild Salmon Center\u2014and why it\u2019s important?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mongolia, as a nation, is very large. Yet we only have 3.3 million people. Right now, most of our rivers are not dammed, but we also have growing pressure to expand our energy production through hydropower. <\/p>\n\n\n

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In February 2025\u2014for the first time in 61 years\u2014scientists and other experts from across Mongolia met for dedicated talks about national fisheries and fish populations. Dr. Avlyush (pictured) was a key convener of the historic meeting. (PC: Mongolian Ministry of Environment and Climate Change, Wildlife Science and Conservation Center of Mongolia.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

People here are looking to the international community to share the good and the bad in their fish management practices, so that we can make the best decisions. Wild Salmon Center can help bridge some of that work. With Wild Salmon Center support, we recently had our first stakeholder meeting on national fisheries and freshwater ecology in more than 60 years<\/a>. It was historic. For the first time, we brought together environmentalists, fish biologists, ecology experts, fishers, and even private sector representatives. Everyone was very happy with this meeting. So much feedback came out of this one-day meeting that within that month, we arranged to officially bring these outcomes to the Mongolian Ministry of Environment and Climate Change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I hope that this momentum can help us with some immediate goals, like training opportunities for rangers who help manage fisheries. That\u2019s one of the new ideas that came from our meeting. But the wider scope is policy reform. We need changes to help protect taimen and other wild fish in Mongolia. Wild Salmon Center can help us develop sound conservation policy<\/a>, tell our story<\/a>, exchange knowledge<\/a>, and focus on stronghold science<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We need changes to help protect taimen and other wild fish in Mongolia. Wild Salmon Center can help us develop sound conservation policy, tell our story, exchange knowledge, and focus on stronghold science. <\/p>\nWild Salmon Center Senior Mongolia Consultant Dr. Saulyegul Avlyush<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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Participants at Mongolia’s historic February 2025 meeting on national fisheries and freshwater ecology. Dr. Avlyush and Dr. Mendsaikhan are seated in the front row, second and third, respectively, from the left. (PC: Mongolian Ministry of Environment and Climate Change, Wildlife Science and Conservation Center of Mongolia.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>

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