Wild Bactrian camels in critical danger of extinction
Wild Bactrian camels (Camelus Ferus), which were considered to be a subspecies of the Bactrian camel, are in danger of extinction in Gobi.
Wild Bactrian camels in critical danger of extinction. Wild Bactrian camels (Camelus Ferus), which were considered to be a subspecies of the Bactrian camel, are in danger of extinction in Gobi. Listed on the SOS, the world’s endangered species list, only 600 wild Bactrian camels reside in the Altai Gobi Desert. This breed of camel was first informed by the Italian traveler Marco Polo in the 13th century and Russian traveler Nikolay Przhevalsky defined wild Bactrian camels and hunted to take samples of the skeleton and skin, during his expedition in Central Asia between 1870 and 1874. Today Mongolia is cooperating with other countries to protect wild Bactrian camels, which are included in the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature /IUCN/. Although the wild Bactrian camels were previously considered to have descended from domesticated Bactrian camels that became feral after escaping from captivity or being returned to the wild, the mitochondrial DNA study displayed 1.9 percent difference between wild and domesticated Bactrian camels, suggesting a divergence date of 0.7-1.5 million years, long before the start of domestication.
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