Camel

General Info :

A camel is an even-toed ungulate within the genus Camelus, bearing distinctive fatty deposits known as "humps" on its back. The two surviving species of camel are the dromedary, or one-humped camel. Both species have been domesticated; they provide milk, meat, hair for textiles or goods such as felted pouches, and are working animals.

Physique :

A full-grown adult camel stands 1.85 m (6 ft 1 in) at the shoulder and 2.15 m (7 ft 1 in) at the hump. Camels can run at up to 65 km/h (40 mph) in short bursts and sustain speeds of up to 40 km/h (25 mph). Bactrian camels weigh 300 to 1,000 kg (660 to 2,200 lb) and dromedaries 300 to 600 kg (660 to 1,300 lb).

Diet :

Camel eat grasses, dried leaves, seeds, and many different types of plants. Especially Dromedary Camels eat a great variety of plants that even include salty types and plants with thorns; they also forage on bones and dried animal carcasses.

Camels regurgitate their food similar to cows. They have a special digestive system that allows them to eat indigestible foods by re-chewing them as “cud.” The “cud” can then be swallowed again for further digestion.

It is widely known that camels have the ability to go without water for extensive periods of time.” They obtain water from the plants that they eat, and when they do get the chance to drink actual water, they drink enormous amounts. This helps to sustain them on the long journeys that they are known to take that last for many miles, carrying goods and people through hot, arid deserts.

Distribution :

There are around 14 million camels alive as of 2010, with 90% being dromedaries. Dromedaries alive today are domesticated animals (mostly living in the Horn of Africa, the Sahel, Maghreb, Middle East and South Asia).

 The Bactrian camel is, as of 2010, reduced to an estimated 1.4 million animals, most of which domesticated.  The only truly wild Bactrian camels, of which there are less than one thousand, are thought to inhabit the Gobi Desert in China and Mongolia.

The largest population of feral camels is in Australia. There are around 700,000 feral dromedary camels in central parts of Australia.

A small population of introduced camels, dromedaries and Bactrians, wandered through Southwest United States after having been imported in the 1800s as part of the U.S. Camel Corps experiment.