How Do Bactrian Camels Survive the Cold? Winter Adaptations

Where Bactrian camels face the cold

The Bactrian camel lives in some of the most extreme climates on Earth. The Gobi Desert and the steppes of Mongolia, northern China and Kazakhstan have a strongly continental climate, far from any ocean. Summers can be scorching, while winters are long, dry and bitterly cold.

In much of this range, winter temperatures regularly drop below −30 °C (−22 °F), and in the coldest valleys of Mongolia and the Altai Mountains they can approach −40 °C (−40 °F). Summer days can climb above 40 °C (104 °F). Few large animals experience a temperature swing of around 80 °C (144 °F) over a single year.

A thick winter coat

The most important winter adaptation is the coat. In autumn a Bactrian camel grows long, dense, woolly hair over its whole body. It has a soft, fine undercoat that traps a layer of warm air next to the skin, covered by longer, coarser guard hairs that keep out wind and snow. Especially long hair, up to about 25 cm (10 in), grows on the neck, throat, humps and upper legs.

Thick hair also grows around the ears and eyes. Long eyelashes and nostrils that can close protect the face from blowing snow and dust, just as they protect it from summer sandstorms.

Shedding for the summer

A coat that is perfect for −30 °C would be dangerous at 40 °C. So in spring Bactrian camels molt very quickly. The winter wool falls out in large sheets and clumps, sometimes making the animals look half-shorn for a few weeks. By summer they have a much thinner coat, which helps them lose heat.

Herders collect the shed wool. The soft undercoat is valued for warm, light textiles, and camel wool is an important product for herding families in Mongolia and northern China.

Eating snow for water

In winter, rivers and springs in the Gobi freeze, so finding liquid water is hard. Bactrian camels solve this by eating snow. They are among the few large mammals that regularly do this to cover their water needs.

There is a cost. Turning snow into body-temperature water takes a great deal of energy, so camels eat snow a little at a time rather than in big gulps. Snow lets them use winter pastures far from any open water, which greatly widens the area they can graze. The wild camel of the Gobi relies on the same trick, as explained in Are there wild Bactrian camels?.

Two humps of stored energy

The humps do not keep a camel warm directly, and they do not hold water. They are stores of fat. In winter, when plants are buried under snow and grazing is poor, a camel burns this fat for energy. A well-fed camel enters winter with firm, upright humps, which gradually shrink and may flop sideways by spring.

Keeping this energy reserve is vital, because a camel must stay warm and keep moving through months of poor food. The science behind the humps is covered in What is in a camel’s hump?.

Feet, food and behavior

Other features help too:

• Broad, tough foot pads. Two toes joined by a wide, leathery pad spread the camel’s weight, helping it walk on snow and frozen ground as well as sand.
• A tough mouth and a flexible diet. Bactrian camels can eat dry, woody, thorny and salty plants that stick out above the snow, which other livestock cannot use.
• Water-saving bodies. Like all camels, they lose very little water through urine and dung, which matters as much in a frozen desert as in a hot one.
• Resting in sheltered spots. In very cold weather camels lie down with their legs folded under the body and their thick chest pad on the ground, a posture that keeps the belly and legs out of the wind.

Bactrian camel vs dromedary in winter

The one-humped dromedary shows how special the Bactrian camel is. Dromedaries have short coats suited to hot deserts and do poorly in cold, wet climates. Bactrian camels, by contrast, thrive where winters are long and freezing, and they have even been used at high altitude in India’s Ladakh region, where loads are carried above 5,000 m (16,400 ft).

Even so, Bactrian camels have limits. Very severe winters, especially when deep snow or a crust of ice covers the pasture, can stop camels from reaching food. In Mongolia these disasters, called dzud, can kill many livestock, including camels. Herders help by providing shelters, hay and protected winter camps.