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Asia and Alaska are now separated by the 90‐km (56‐mile)‐wide Bering Strait. However, during the height of one of the early Pleistocene glacial periods, the sea level was lowered sufficiently to expose a wide land bridge [27]. Plant and animal species moved back and forth across this bridge; the camel line of Camelidae migrated from North America into Asia to continue the evolutionary process, dying out in North America.

Once in Asia, Camelus radiated through eastern Europe (Romania and southern Russia), the Middle East, and North Africa as far west as the Atlantic and as far south as Tanzania. It is likely that the dromedary evolved from the Bactrian camel, though the hump(s) may be an acquired characteristic of domestication. Wild camels had become virtually extinct in North Africa before historic times (3000 BCE). Only C. bactrianus ferus now exists in the wild state in one small area in the Trans‐Altai Gobi Desert on the border of Mongolia and China, with a limited population of roughly 1000 animals (Figure 1.15) [4, 5, 28].