Talk:Camel/@comment-91.178.28.107-20151221162755/@comment-25565811-20161111195421

You'll get the message owned by an NPC only, if the animal was a mount of a riding NPC before and the rider was killed. The camels at the camp, are spawned in with the generation of the camp, so they didn't belong to mounted units before.

If you found one with a chest and saddle, it must have been on a server and left there by another player.