Desert and the Gobi

Sand and sand dunes occupy about 10% of Mongolia’s territory, but much of the Gobi is a plain of scrub and gravel rather than sand, with scattered salt and soda lakes. Summer flash-floods spread widely across the impermeable surface to create raging torrents which cut channels 1m or more deep as the water drains off to find its level and then soaks away. These dried-up channels represent a hazard to cross-country vehicles.

The Trans-Altai Gobi, between the Gobi-Altai and the border with Chinese Xinjiang, is the last-known habitat of the takhi, the Mongolian wild horse or Przewalski horse, which was returned from captive-bred foreign stock (in international zoos, reserves and private collections) after the pure native variety became extinct. Also in this region are Khulan, or wild asses, and saiga antelope-found only in southwest Mongolia.