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CooperToons has sung the praises of many inhabitants of the earth - pigs, cows, elephants, giraffes, cats, dogs, and gorillas. But he was aghast to find out that he had omitted any representatives of the genus camelus. Of course, as long as you're aghast in my house feel free to do what you want, but here's a camel.

But not just any camel. This was a very friendly camel who stuck his head into the window as the CooperToons automobile drove through a safari park. This was one of the parks where you got a bucket of animal feed and could stop and feed the animals. A similar encounter at the same park was with a rhea, the ostrich-like bird of South America. Needless to say having a camel stick his head through your window is a bit more memorable.

Despite their reputation for discourtesy, this was a very well-mannered camel who did not spit.

Of course, most people know camels are divided into two general groups - the one humpers and the two humpers. Camel Cognoscenti know these respectively as the dromedary - found in Africa and in southern regions of Asia - and the Bactrian who hails from northwest China and southern Mongolia.

Because of their usefulness, camels have become surprisingly widespread and at one time literally ranged around the world. In early 1800's camels were imported into Australia, all the better (so they thought) to help explorers tramp the Outback. And in 1855, the United States Congress authorized the United States Camel Corps, a division of the army who tested the suitability of using camels in the American desert. The program was overseen by none other than the then Secretary of War, Jefferson Davis, later the first (and last) president of the Confederacy. The camel experiment, by the way, was - quote - "immortalized" - unquote - in the 1976 movie "Hawmps!" which boasted of - if nothing else - a couple of first rate supporting actors like Jack Elam and Slim Pickens. It was a movie that was not intended to be taken very seriously, either by the cast, the critics, or the public, which was a good thing.

In the end, the conclusions about the efficacy of the camel for US soldiers were mixed, but generally the cavalry preferred to keep their horses and just not wander too far from water. The camel experiment more or less just petered out before the Civil War, and an oft heard story is the camels were turned loose to roam at will. Actually most were sold to zoos, circuses, or just curious ranchers. But some did escape, and in North America the last reported sightings (note plural and qualification) of feral camels were sometime between 1930 and the early 1940's.

In Australia, though, the camels fared much better although their cantankerous nature and the advent of motorized transport finally brought about their end as domesticated beasts of burden. As in North America, some escaped to the wild, but unlike their American cousins, they continued to thrive. As of this writing there are about a million - that's a million - wild camels living in the Land Down Under. They are doing well - so well that there is a concern that the large ungulates are wreaking serious havoc on the desert ecosystems and the agricultural and ranching industries. If the camels keep going at the same rate, in seventy five years their population will equal that of the Australian rabbits.

If the Aussies thought they have problems now, just wait.