Knowing how our customers like to totally immerse themselves in the culture we, supply you with information about an animal without which life in the dessert could not survive. From time to time we will place notices and information about what "Wilber, the dromedary" and his cousins are up to..
"Be careful they spit!" - the details about Camel spitting.
- There are two misrepresentations in the statement above.
- First, camels do not spit frequently and only do so when provoked.
- Second, they do not really truly "spit" since the substance they are spraying is not saliva.
- Camels do not spit unless they become agitated and upset.
- Camels that are trained and handled on a regular basis are usually very cooperative animals and very rarely will "spit."
- What camels do is not really spitting in the sense that humans spit.
- Agitators do get sprayed, but they are not being sprayed with saliva.
- When a person spits what they are really doing is forcing saliva out of their mouth with a rush of air. To focus the spray, humans will contract their lips making a smaller opening and resulting in more air pressure.
- Instead of emitting saliva, camels will emit some of the partially digested contents of one of the chambers of their fore-stomachs.
- Similar to cows, camels are ruminants. When they get mad they will burp up some of their cud (the semi-digested contents of their fore-stomach).
- Once this is in their mouth they flapped their heads. The cud slides out of their mouth onto their limp, droopy lips which then fling the cud into the air.
- In this way they can completely cover the upper half of a human.
- The color of their "spit" is tied to their recent dietary intake. If the animal has been eating grass or alfalfa it will be greenish.
Camel Trivia - Here we have some quick facts and figures about camels.
- Camels are even-toed ungulates within the genus Camelus. The dromedary, one-humped or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the Bactrian camel has two humps. They are native to the dry desert areas of western Asia, and central and east Asia, respectively.
- The average life expectancy of a camel is sixty to eighty years.
- The term camel is also used more broadly to describe any of the six camel-like creatures in the family Camelidae: the two true camels, and the four South American camelids, the llama, alpaca, guanaco, and vicuña.
- A fully-grown adult camel stands 6 ft 1 in at the shoulder and 7 ft 1 in at the hump.
- The hump rises about thirty inches out of its body.
- Camels can run up to 40 mph in short bursts and sustain speeds of up to 25 mph.
- The dromedary and the Bactrian camel are both still used for milk, meat, and as beasts of burden.
- The almost 14 million dromedaries alive today are domesticated animals (mostly living in Somalia, Sudan, Mauritania and nearby countries).
- The Bactrian camel is now reduced to an estimated 1.4 million animals, mostly domesticated. It is thought that there are about 1000 wild Bactrian camels in the Gobi Desert in China and Mongolia.
- There is a substantial feral population of dromedaries estimated at up to 700,000 in central parts of Australia, descended from individuals introduced as means of transport in the 19th century and early 20th century.
- A small population of introduced camels, Dromedaries and Bactrians, survived in the Southwest United States until the 1900s.
- These animals, imported from Turkey, were part of the US Camel Corps experiment and used as draft animals in mines and escaped or were released after the project was terminated.
- A descendant of one of these was seen by a backpacker in Los Padres National Forest in 1972.
- Dromedary-Bactrian hybrids are called bukhts, are larger than either parent, have a single hump and are good draft camels.
- Camels do not store water in their humps as is commonly believed; they are actually a reservoir of fatty tissue. When this tissue is metabolized, it acts as a source of energy, and would yield more than 1 g of water for each 1 g of fat converted through reaction with oxygen from air.
- Their red blood cells have an oval shape, unlike those of other mammals, which are circular. This is to facilitate their flow in a dehydrated state.
- These cells are also more stable in order to withstand high osmotic variation without rupturing when drinking large amounts of water 26 US gal40 US gal in one drink.
- Camels are able to withstand changes in body temperature and water content that would kill most other animals.
- Their temperature ranges from 93 °F at night up to 106 °F during the day, and only above this threshold will they begin to sweat.
- The upper body temperature range is often not reached during the day in milder climatic conditions, and therefore, the camel may not sweat at all during the day. Evaporation of their sweat takes place at the skin level, not at the surface of their coat, thereby being very efficient at cooling the body compared to the amount of water lost through sweating.
- This ability to fluctuate body temperature and the efficiency of their sweating allows them to preserve about five litres of water a day.
- A feature of their nostrils is that a large amount of water vapor in their exhalations is trapped and returned to their body fluids, thereby reducing the amount of water lost through respiration.
- They can withstand at least 20-25% weight loss due to sweating (most mammals can only withstand about 3-4% dehydration before cardiac failure results from the thickened blood).
- A camel's blood remains hydrated, even though the body fluids are lost, until this 25% limit is reached.
- Camels eating green herbage can ingest sufficient moisture in milder conditions to maintain their body's hydrated state without the need for drinking.
- A camel's thick coat reflects sunlight.
- A shorn camel has to sweat 50% more to avoid overheating. It also insulates them from the intense heat that radiates from the desert sand. Their long legs help by keeping them further from the hot ground.
- Camels have been known to swim.
- Their mouth is very sturdy, able to chew thorny desert plants.
- Long eyelashes and ear hairs, together with sealable nostrils, form a barrier against sand.
- Their gait (moving both legs on one side at the same time) and their widened feet help them move without sinking into the sand.
- The kidneys and intestines of a camel are very efficient at retaining water.
- Urine comes out as a thick syrup, and their feces are so dry that they can fuel fires.
- The camel is the only animal to have replaced the wheel (mainly in North Africa) where the wheel had already been established.
- Attempts have been made to employ camels as cavalry and dragoon mounts and as freight animals in lieu of horses and mules.
- The camels were mostly used in combat because of their ability to scare off horses in close ranges.
- The horses detest the smell of camels, and therefore, the horses in the vicinity become harder to control.
- The United States Army had an active camel corps stationed in California in the 19th century.
- Camels have been used in wars throughout Africa, and also in the East Roman Empire as auxiliary forces known as Dromedarii recruited in desert provinces.
- Camel milk is a staple food of desert nomad tribes and is richer in fat and protein than cow milk.
- Camel milk cannot be made into butter in the traditional churning method.
- It can be made if it is soured first, churned, and then a clarifying agent is added, or if it is churned at 75–76 °F, but times will vary greatly in achieving results.
- The milk can readily be made into yogurt.
- Butter or yogurt made from camel milk is said to have a very faint greenish tinge. Camel milk is said to have many healthful properties and is used as a medicinal product in India.
- Bedouin tribes believe that camel milk has great curative powers if the camel's diet consists of certain plants.
- In Ethiopia, the milk is considered an aphrodisiac.
- Camel milk, until recently, was impossible to make into traditional cheese since rennet was unable to coagulate the milk proteins to allow the collection of curds.
- Cheese produced with vegetable rennet has low levels of cholesterol and lactose.
- The sale of camel cheese is limited due to the low yield of cheese from milk and the uncertainty of pasteurization levels for camel milk which makes adherence to dairy import regulations difficult.
- A camel carcass can provide a substantial amount of meat.
- The male dromedary carcass can weigh 900 lb.
- The carcass of a male Bactrian can weigh up to 1,400 lb.
- The brisket, ribs and loin are among the preferred parts, but the hump is considered a delicacy and is most favored.
- It is reported that camel meat tastes like coarse beef, but older camels can prove to be tough and less flavorful.
- Camel meat has been eaten for centuries. It has been recorded by ancient Greek writers as an available dish in ancient Persia at banquets, usually roasted whole.
- The ancient Roman emperor Heliogabalus enjoyed camel's heel.
- Not just the meat, but also blood is a consumable item as is the case in northern Kenya, where camel blood is a source of iron, vitamin D, salts and minerals.
- According to Jewish tradition, camel meat and milk are taboo.
- Camels possess only one of the two Kosher criteria; although they chew their cuds, they do not possess split hooves.
- The Bactrian camel (Camelus bactrianus) is native to the steppes of eastern Asia. The Bactrian camel has two humps on its back, in contrast to the dromedary which has one.
- Bactrian camels are over 2 meters (7 feet) tall at the hump and weigh in excess of 725 kg (1,600 lb). They are herbivores, eating grass, leaves, and grains, capable of drinking up to 32 gallons of water at a time; this is usually in the form of ice or snow eaten in small but frequent amounts.
- Their mouths are extremely tough, allowing them to eat thorny desert plants like asparagus.
- They are supremely adapted to protect themselves against the desert heat and sand, with wide, padded feet and thick leathery pads on the knees and chest, nostrils that can open and close, ears lined with protective hairs, and bushy eyebrows with two rows of long eyelashes.
- Thick fur and underwool keep the animal warm during cold desert nights and also insulate against daytime heat.
- Bactrian camels have two coats: the warm inside coat of down and a rough outer coat which is long and hairy.
- They shed their hair in clumps consisting of both coats, which can be gathered and separated. They produce approximately 15 lb of fiber annually. The fiber structure is similar to cashmere wool.
- The down is usually 1–3 inches long. While camel down does not felt easily, it may be spun into a yarn for knitting.
- The dromedary (Camelus dromedarius) is the only other surviving camel, native to the Sahara desert, but today is extinct in the wild except as a feral species in Australia.
- The Bactrian camel is a stockier, hardier animal able to survive temperature extremes from the scorching desert heat of northern Iran to the frozen winters in Tibet.
- The dromedary is taller and faster, and with a rider it can maintain 8–9 mph for hours at a time. A loaded Bactrian Camel moves at about 2.5 mph.
- It is thought that the Bactrian camel was domesticated (independently from the dromedary) sometime before 2500 BCE, probably in northern Iran, Northeast Afghanistan and Northern Pakistan or southwestern Turkestan
- The dromedary is believed to have been domesticated between 4000 BCE and 2000 BCE in Arabia.
- The ancestors of Australian feral camels were dromedary camels imported to provide transport through inland Australia, which their feral descendents have since made their domain.
- While they do not appear to be as destructive as other introduced herbivores, their increasing numbers may affect native vegetation, and feral camels have become minor agricultural pests.
- Many different types and breeds of camels were brought into Australia with, but most were from India.
- They included the large, fleece-bearing, two-humped Bactrian camel of China and Mongolia, the elite Bishari riding camel of North Africa and Arabia, the pedigreed Bikaneri war camel of Rajasthan in India, and the powerful, freight-carrying lowland Indian camel, capable of moving huge loads of up to 1760 pounds.
- The Australian camels, roving in the only feral herds of their kind in the world and reckoned to number between 500,000 and 700,000.
- In a famous race, the mount of a cameleer named 'Abd al-Wadi was beaten by a horse in a 176-kilometre (109-mile) run between Bourke and Wanaaring in New South Wales, completed between sunrise and sunset. But the horse died the next day, while 'Abd al-Wadi proudly rode his camel back to the starting point.
- Australia boasts the largest population of feral camels and the only herd of dromedary (one-humped) camels exhibiting wild behaviour in the world.
- Live camels are exported to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Brunei and Malaysia, where disease-free wild camels are prized as a delicacy.
Aepycamelus, the prehistoric camel from Colorado
- Aepycamelus is the new name of Alticamelus (meaning "tall camel"). This very tall prehistoric camel lived from the middle through late Miocene (roughly 10 million to 5 million years ago).
- Aepycamelus had extremely long legs and a long, S-shaped neck. Its head was about 10 feet above the ground. It had small hooves on its two toes and broad pads on the feet. Its tail was very short, it had a small back hump, and the snout was elongated.
- Aepycamelus was a very fast runner. It probably ran in the same way that modern-day camels and giraffes do, called pacing. In this gait, the animal moves both legs on one side of the body at a time (only relatives of the giraffes and camels run like this).
- Fossils of Aepycamelus have been found in Colorado, USA.
- Fossil evidence indicates that the ancestors of modern camels evolved in North America during the Paleocene period, and later spread to Asia.
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