#camelops

Panderodus/Eustreptospondylus

Sabertoothed cat and ancient camels, University of Kansas Natural History Museum, Lawrence, KS

today's daily is: the camelops! (c. kansanus)

Internet Archive

Camels can be temperamental. They’ll even “spit” at you if they feel threatened. But they are also amazingly hard-working, graceful, and rather comical in appearance. While camels are stereotypically associated with the Middle East and Africa, they actually originated in North America around 45 or 50 million years ago. The earliest known North American camel genus was Protylopus and was the size of a rabbit. That prehistoric camel evolved into the Camelops – the last species of the large North American camel. Eventually, the American camel migrated into Asia and beyond. In essence, one could say that camels are “Made in America.” But how did Camelops get from the Americas to Asia, and why don’t we have camels in North America anymore?

Camelops are an extinct genus of camel that lived in Western North America from 3 million years ago to 10,000 years ago. It is unknown how many humps this camel had, but it probably had two. This camel was slightly larger than today's camels, reaching up to 2.2 meters (7 ft 3 inches) at the shoulder, and weighing at 800kg (18,000 lbs). There was a specimen found under Walmart in 2007 that was dated to be over 10,000 years old. Artwork by MadCarno: https://www.deviantart.com/madcarno

Salmon storage boxes placed in trees by Indigenous fishers of the Fraser River, B.C., 1868. [2367 × 3000] Check this blog!