The gemsbok, also known as the oryx, is the national animal of Namibia, also appearing on the country’s coat of arms. The large antelope is prevalent in southwestern Africa, and both males and females sport distinctive long, straight horns. They can survive up to 10 months without drinking water, easily making their home among the sands of the Namib Desert.

Camel spiders are not scorpions, and they’re not technically spiders either. They are solifugids, a separate order of Arachnida from spiders. They have another nickname, too: The fast-moving nocturnal arthropod is also called the “Kalahari Ferrari,” running up to 10 mph while hunting. When a solifugid catches its prey — which range from ants to birds — it bites it into pieces, then adds its digestive enzymes to dissolve them into a drinkable liquid.

Both Bactrian and Dromedary camels are herbivores uniquely adapted to survive in the desert, with nostrils that close to keep out sand. The main difference between the two is the number of humps. An easy way to remember: The letter “B” has two humps, as does the Bactrian Camel, while the letter “D” (and the Dromedary) each have one hump.

At first glance, lithops appear to be nothing more than rocks in shades of gray, green, and red. It’s a camouflage technique to hide from herbivores as they grow in rocky, arid regions of Africa. Each “living stone” has two thick leaves (which also gives it the appearance of a cloven hoof), and a single flower sprouts from the slit between the two leaves.

Przewalski's horse — known as the “takhi” in Mongolia — is the only truly “wild” horse in existence, as they have never been tamed. Horses like mustangs and brumbies are feral species, since their ancestors were domesticated animals that escaped captivity. There are about 2,000 Przewalski's horses who roam the steppes of Central Asia.

There are more than 30 species of rattlesnakes, which live in the Western Hemisphere. The snakes’ tails end in a series of interlocking rings of keratin, and a segment is naturally added to the rattle each time they shed their skin. Rattlesnakes shed multiple times per year, and their rattles often break off. The size of the rattle doesn’t matter, either — even a baby rattlesnake has enough venom to cause injury.

The caracal is not actually a type of lynx, but both medium-sized wild cats have distinctive tufts of fur at the tips of their long, pointy ears. Lynx stick to the forests of Europe, Asia, and North America, while caracals live in Africa, across the Middle East, and into northern India. Caracals are carnivores, and their pointy ears can rotate like satellite dishes to help them hunt prey, including antelope, hares, rodents, and birds.

Guanacos, vicuñas, llamas, and alpacas are all camelids, relatives of the camel, found in South America. Llamas and alpacas were domesticated long ago, but guanacos and vicuñas live in the wild in western South America. Guanacos prefer the drier parts of the high plains and the Atacama Desert, while vicuñas prefer to stay closer to water, found in the cooler parts of the Andes mountains.

The fennec fox is the smallest type of fox in the world, but it also has the largest ears of any type of fox. It is a nocturnal hunter, so its thick fur coat is quite useful on chilly nights in the Sahara Desert. It can survive without drinking water for a long time, finding enough hydration in its diet of grasshoppers, rodents, lizards, birds, eggs, and fruits.

We usually associate penguins with icy landscapes, but Magellanic penguins can be found where the desert meets the sea. That includes the Atlantic coast of Patagonia, as well as the Pacific coast of the Atacama Desert. After breeding season, Magellanic penguins head north to spend winter along the coasts of Brazil and Peru.

The elf owl is the smallest owl in the world, standing less than six inches tall and weighing less than a golf ball. It hunts bugs and spiders, and sometimes larger prey, like lizards and scorpions. Elf owls live in the deserts of the American Southwest and spend winters in Mexico. They often take up residence inside saguaro cacti, inside holes made by woodpeckers.

In addition to producing much-needed shade in the desert, some palm trees also produce fruit. The date palm is found throughout North Africa and the Middle East, and a mature tree can produce hundreds of pounds of dates in a season. Other palm trees that produce fruit include coconut palms, acai palms, jelly palms, or peach palms.

All tortoises are turtles, but not all turtles are tortoises. A key difference is the feet — turtles have flippers or webbed feet, while tortoises have elephantine feet and cannot swim. Tortoises are also not invertebrates — they have both an endoskeleton (spine and ribs) and an exoskeleton (shell). It may look like armor, but the shell is sensitive to the touch, and some tortoises enjoy being pet or scratched.

There are 2,000 known species of scorpions, found in deserts and rainforests around the world. The deathstalker scorpion, found in the Middle East and North Africa (including the Sahara Desert) is the most venomous scorpion, although its sting is not likely to kill a healthy adult human. In fact, the deathstalkers’ cocktail of dangerous neurotoxins is prized for its use in medical research and treatments for cancer, malaria, and tuberculosis.

Australia has prohibited the export of bearded dragons, also known by their scientific genus name, Pogona, since the 1960s. However, the lizards were smuggled and bred in captivity to be housepets around the world. Their “beard” is a spiny pouch under their chin that changes size and color, depending on the animal’s mood.

A javelina looks like a pig, but is actually a kind of peccary, a similarly hoofed mammal that is native to the Western Hemisphere. Both swine and peccaries are omnivores with distinctive powerful snouts, but the two species differ in shape, size, tusks, and number of teeth. Javelinas, also known as collared peccaries, are found in the U.S. from Arizona to western Texas. The species lives as far south as northern Argentina.

Joshua trees are not technically trees. The succulents are a member of the Agave family, and they are found in the Mojave Desert of Southern California, Nevada, and Arizona. Joshua trees grow very slowly, and they require specific conditions to thrive. The survival of the Joshua tree is wholly reliant on Yucca moths to transfer pollen between blossoms in order to produce seeds, and Yucca moth larvae feed on and disperse the seeds.

Dingoes are Australia’s wild dogs, and they are hardy enough to thrive in pretty much any environment, including the Australian Outback. In fact, there are so many dingoes that Australia built the “dingo fence,” a barrier stretching more than 3,000 miles long to protect farmland from the furry pest. They prefer to hunt small animals, but they do eat fruits and plants, and they also scavenge.

Roadrunners measure about two feet from beak to tail, and their bodies extend horizontal to the ground when they run. Roadrunners are often found in the deserts of the Southwest United States and Mexico, running near roadsides as they hunt prey, which includes venomous lizards, scorpions, and even rattlesnakes.

Cacti are better known for their needles, but they have blossoms, too. Arizona’s state flower is the blossom of the saguaro cactus, which blooms for less than 24 hours, starting in the early evening and fading by noon the following day. It’s a short window, but nocturnal bats and early-morning honey bees make quick work of the nectar and facilitate cross-pollination.

With wide swaths of open desert, Australia makes an ideal home for one of the most famous desert animals of all — the camel. Despite having the world’s largest population of camels, the animals are not indigenous to Australia. Camels were brought to the continent from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s. Today, there are an estimated 1 million camels roaming Australia’s deserts.