Acacia erioloba is also commonly known as the Camel Thorn, Kameeldoring (Afrikaans

Afrikaans

Afrikaans is a West Germanic language, spoken natively in South Africa and Namibia. It is a daughter language of Dutch, originating in its 17th century dialects, collectively referred to as Cape Dutch .Afrikaans is a daughter language of Dutch; see , , , , , .Afrikaans was historically called Cape...

), Giraffe Thorn or Mokala (Tswana

Tswana language

Tswana or Setswana is a language spoken in Southern Africa by about 4.5 million people. It is a Bantu language belonging to the Niger–Congo language family within the Sotho languages branch of Zone S , and is closely related to the Northern- and Southern Sotho languages, as well as the Kgalagadi...

). The Mokala National Park

Mokala National Park

Mokala National Park is a reserve established in the Plooysburg area south-west of Kimberley in the Northern Cape, South Africa on 19 June 2007. The size of the Park is 26 485 hectares. Mokala is the Setswana name for the magnificent camel thorn, a tree species typical of the arid western interior...

 in the Northern Cape

Northern Cape

The Northern Cape is the largest and most sparsely populated province of South Africa. It was created in 1994 when the Cape Province was split up. Its capital is Kimberley. It includes the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park, part of an international park shared with Botswana...

 is named after this tree. The type specimen of Acacia giraffae, proved on closer examination to be a hybrid of A. haematoxylon and the species which would later become known as A. erioloba. The name A. erioloba was therefore proposed for the vast numbers of Camel Thorn which are not hybrids.

It is a thorn acacia

Acacia

Acacia is a genus of shrubs and trees belonging to the subfamily Mimosoideae of the family Fabaceae, first described in Africa by the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus in 1773. Many non-Australian species tend to be thorny, whereas the majority of Australian acacias are not...

 native to the drier parts of Southern Africa

Southern Africa

Southern Africa is the southernmost region of the African continent, variably defined by geography or geopolitics. Within the region are numerous territories, including the Republic of South Africa ; nowadays, the simpler term South Africa is generally reserved for the country in English.-UN...

.