As of 2020, which species of camels is now critically endangered?

As of 2020, there are three surviving species of camels. The one-hump dromedary also called the Arabian, the domesticated two-humped Bactrian camel and a third and separate species called the Wild Bactrian camel which is now critically endangered according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

All three have distinctive fatty deposits known as “humps’ on their backs.

Currently this endangered species lives in part of northern China and southern Mongolia. Genetic studies have established the Wild Bactrian camel species which diverged from the Bactrian camel about 1.1 million years ago. Only about 1,000 camels still survive, with most living on the ‘Lop Nur Wild Camel National Nature Reserve’ in China and a smaller population reside in a nature preserve called the ‘Great Gobi A Strictly Protected Area’ in the southwestern part of Mongolia.

Australia currently has approximately 700,000 dromedary camels that are now feral (now wild but descended from domesticated) initially imported from British India and Afghanistan and used as a method of transport in the 19th and 20th centuries. A growth rate of 8% per year requires the Australian government to cull more than 100,000 of the animals because the camels use too much of the limited resources needed by sheep farmers.

‘Camelops’ is an extinct genus of camels.