By Wes Wright, Dubai Three camels are being used as surrogate mothers to raise hybrid camas at the Sheikh Mohammed Centre for Camel Reproduction. But at least two camels may lose or may have already lost the foetuses, according to Project Director Dr Lulu Skidmore. The centre stunned the world in January 1997 when Rama the Cama, the first of a new species, was born from a llama mother fertilised with camel semen. The birth put the centre on the map as a pioneering leader in cross-breeding and prompted other scientists to try to duplicate Dubai's success.
Camels can cope better with the desert heat and have bigger wombs than llamas.
Two camels are 11 months into their pregnancies and may give birth within two weeks to a month. The third is two months pregnant, Skidmore said yesterday. But she said she would be delighted if live offspring were born. It's a very unknown area for the gestation period as it takes 11 months for a llama and 13 months for a camel and a cama is somewhere in between. The centre is continuing its ground-breaking research into freezing fertilised embryos and then implanting them into a camel.