He studied mathematics and geography in Berlin and Halle, where he graduated in 1888 with a dissertation on the lakes of Mansfeld, Die Mansfelder Seen. The following year he obtained his habilitation with a study on the depth ratios of Masurian lakes. In 1889 he also became managing director of the Academy of Sciences Leopoldina.
In 1907 he became an associate professor at the University of Rostock, where in 1919 he was appointed full professor. He was editor of the Geographischen Arbeite and the Mitteilungen der geographischen Gesellschaft zu Rostock (Releases of the Geographical Society of Rostock). Ule is sometimes referred to as "the founder of geography in Mecklenburg".[1]
