Previous Issues

Department of Zoology, University of Kuwait

Abstract.

The water content of the various tissues of both the young and the adult Arabian camel was determined. The distribution of water among the different tissues was found to be in the same order as that in other mammals and no one tissue was found to possess unusual amounts of water. However, the body fluids, whether in the young or the adult, had highest content of water, and nuclear tissues were more watery than the nuclear ones. Among the nuclear tissues, the water content was found to be directly proportional to the cytoplasmic content and to the metabolic activity of the tissue. The skin, which contained the least amount of water among tile nuclear tissues, displayed certain variations depending on the part of the animal from which it was sampled. Furthermore, all tissues of the young camel contained more water than those of the adult. While the plasma, the lung and the cardiac muscles of the young camel differed only slightly in their water content from the corresponding ones of the adult, the hump-fat, the tendon and the skin differed markedly in their water content. The wall of alimentary canal, of both the young and the adult camel, showed a gradual increase in its water content as we passed from the oesophagus to the rectum. This was in contrast to their inclusions which showed gradual decrease in the amount of water in the respective regions. It was also found that the wall of the rectum, besides that of the colon, possessed a considerable power for water absorption. This was emphasized by the relatively very low amount of water in the faeces. The different regions of the alimentary canal of the young camel, similar to its various tissues, were more watery than those of the adult. All the data were statistically analysed.