Phenotypic and Comparative Analysis of Beauty Camels (Camelus Dromedarius) from Oman

Abstract

The dromedary camel (Camelus dromedarius) plays an important role in the socioeconomic lives of nomadic pastoral communities scattered across the Middle East and Northern Africa. Camel beauty competitions are highly encouraged and appreciated by members of countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The owners of winning camels bag prizes worth millions of US dollars. The absence of properly documented and scientifically evaluated characteristics of beauty camels in Oman could lead to the loss of this part of the rich culture and tradition in the future, confining it among breeders exclusively. Additionally, beauty competitions lack a formal scoring system, which may affect the accuracy of beauty camel rankings and winner selections. In this thesis, we aimed to document and scientifically evaluate beauty camel characteristics, and lay the basis to transform the traditional visual observation qualitative judgement into a precise quantitative numerical scoring system. Additionally, the documentation of beauty camel characteristics and identification of ideal method to measure them, allowed us to develop discriminatory tools that are quantitative to differentiate between Omani beauty camels and other Omani camel types and between winner and non-winner beauty camels participating in beauty competitions. Moreover, several biochemical parameters for the three types of competition camels in Oman have been investigated. The comparison showed there were differences between different camel types. These studies will allow a process to be developed to make judgements more transparently for the owners and keepers of the camels entering these competitions. It will also open new research areas, where the genetics of beauty, racing and production (milk and meat) traits can be investigated to elucidate the biology, physiology, nutrition and behaviour of these wonderful animals