“Dromedary camels have one hump; Bactrian camels have two.”
The dromedary camel is a desert mammal with one hump, built to survive extreme heat and scarce water. It has carried people and goods across deserts for thousands of years.
By An Nguyen · Updated
Camelus dromedariusArtiodactylaCamelidae
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Core article
A closer look at habitat, diet, behavior, reproduction, and conservation.
For thousands of years the dromedary camel (Camelus dromedarius) has crossed deserts where almost no other large animal can survive. This one-humped herbivore is engineered for heat, sand, and long journeys on little water — and from the Sahara to Arabia it remains a working transport animal and an emblem of desert life. Nearly all camels alive today are dromedaries, and almost all are domestic or feral rather than wild.
Adults stand 6 to 7 feet at the hump and weigh 660 to 1,500 pounds. The single hump stores up to 80 pounds of fat, not water — a myth worth correcting; concentrating fat in one place also leaves the rest of the body less insulated, so heat escapes more easily, and the hump shrinks and flops once the reserve is spent. The real savings come from physiology and behavior: the camel lets its body temperature swing through the day so it sweats less, its kidneys make concentrated urine, and its gut reclaims so much water that the dung comes out dry. Oval red blood cells keep flowing through thickened blood when the animal is severely dehydrated and tolerate rapid dilution when it finally drinks. Long lashes, bushy brows, and closable nostrils keep sand out, and broad two-toed feet over an elastic pad spread the load on soft ground. It belongs to the family Camelidae; one hump separates it at a glance from the two-humped Bactrian camel and the wild Camelus ferus.
Dromedaries occupy desert and semi-desert across North Africa, the Middle East, and Arabia — from Morocco and Mauritania through Egypt, Sudan, and the Horn of Africa into Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, Yemen, and parts of India. Because they are domestic or feral almost everywhere, "where camels live" is partly a question of human land use: pastoral herds move between seasonal grazing and water points, occupying gravel plains, dry steppe, and thorn scrub as much as dune seas. Australia also holds large feral herds descended from 19th-century imports, self-sustaining in the arid interior — proof of the species' tolerance, though big groups can foul waterholes and strip vegetation native animals need.
Dromedaries are flexible herbivores, eating dry grasses, leaves, thorny shrubs, seeds, and salt-tolerant plants most animals avoid. A mobile, split upper lip picks leaves from between thorns, and a tough mouth lining resists the abrasive stems. As ruminants they regurgitate and re-chew the cud, fermenting fibre in a foregut full of microbes to wring energy from low-grade forage. They can go weeks without drinking when plants hold enough moisture, and then a dehydrated camel can gulp around 30 gallons in minutes. Claims of a fixed number of waterless days are misleading — temperature, workload, diet, and starting condition all change the answer.
Wild and feral dromedaries form herds of up to 20, usually led by a dominant male, while domestic camels are managed in larger groups. They recognize familiar companions and keep spacing through posture, neck movements, calls, and scent, resting through peak heat and moving in cooler hours to save water. The famous "spitting" is really saliva mixed with regurgitated foregut contents, aimed at a threat or rival rather than used in routine contact. During the rut, males turn dangerous — inflating a soft-palate sac called the dulaa, giving off strong odors, and fighting by biting and shoving with the neck.
After about 13 months' gestation a female bears a single calf, born with a small hump and able to stand and walk within hours — essential in open desert. The hump is not a fat store at birth; it fills out as the calf grows and begins banking surplus energy. Calves nurse for 10 to 18 months and stay close for protection, and females usually calve only every two to three years. That slow turnover, with long gestation and single births, means herds recover slowly from heavy losses. Dromedaries live 40 to 50 years, among the longest-lived hoofed mammals.
The dromedary is Least Concern, with an estimated 15 million worldwide, almost all domesticated. There is no recognized surviving wild population — Australia's free-ranging animals are feral descendants of domestic stock, and the rare camels of the Gobi are the distinct two-humped Camelus ferus, not wild dromedaries. Domestic herds are numerous, but particular breeds and pastoral systems remain vulnerable to prolonged drought, disease, lost grazing access, and shrinking genetic diversity. In Australia the aim flips: feral camels crowd water sources and damage native plants, so control programs and commercial harvest are used in places — a reminder that global conservation status and local ecological impact are separate questions.
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Chordata
Class
Mammalia
Order
Artiodactyla
Family
Camelidae
Genus
Camelus
Species
C. dromedarius
Dromedary camels have one hump; Bactrian camels have two.
A camel's hump stores fat, not water — the fat provides energy when food is scarce.
Camels can drink up to 30 gallons of water in one session after a long dry period.
They have three eyelids and two rows of eyelashes to keep sand out.
Dromedary camels are the tallest camels and are sometimes called ships of the desert.
Their red blood cells are oval-shaped, so they keep flowing even when dehydrated.
Select a question to reveal the answer.
A dromedary camel is a large desert mammal with a single hump. It is the most common camel species and lives in hot deserts of Africa and the Middle East.
They live in desert habitats across North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, the Middle East, and parts of South Asia. Feral populations also exist in Australia.
The hump stores fat that camels can burn for energy when food and water are hard to find. It is not a water tank.
Dromedary camels are herbivores that eat dry grasses, leaves, thorny plants, and desert shrubs that many animals cannot digest.
They conserve water with efficient kidneys, tolerate high body heat, store fat in their hump, and have padded feet and protective eyelashes for sandy conditions.
A baby camel is called a calf. Calves can stand and walk within hours of birth.
Dromedary camels are listed as Least Concern. Millions are kept as domestic animals, though wild populations are rare.
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