Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 4, 2017)
Wednesday, October 4, 2017 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon Paw Prints Jodi Schneider McNamee Columnist Should you clone your pet? Maybe you’ve had that extra-special pet, the one you just couldn’t bear to say goodbye to. What if you didn’t really have to? You might remember when Dolly the sheep was cloned in 1996. It’s been over 20 years since Dolly made the headlines, and clon- ing has come a long way. Scientists have managed to clone a variety of animals, including cats, cows, horses, mice, mules, pigs, rabbits, and rats but had been unable to successfully clone a dog due to the problematic job of maturing a canine ovum in an artificial environment. Then after a few failed attempts by other scientists, Woo Suk Hwang, a lead researcher at Seoul National University in South Korea, was able to suc- cessfully create a clone using tissue from the ear of a three- year-old Afghan hound. Snuppy the Afghan hound is credited with being the world’s first cloned dog in 2005. A year later the same South Korea firm, Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, began offering pet cloning to anyone will- ing to pay the $100,000 fee. Commercial cloning became an option, although limited to the wealthy. The science has advanced at an interesting time as peo- ple are increasingly seeing their pets as members of the family. One well-publicized clon- ing was of Trakr, a former police dog hailed as a hero after discovering the last sur- vivor of the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. The faithful hound passed away in 2009, but before he passed away his pet parent James Symington entered a contest for the world’s most “clone- worthy dog” that offered to clone a pet dog for free. Sooam produced five clones after Trakr’s owner won the contest. In 2015, ViaGen, a Texas company that had been clon- ing horses and livestock, expanded, and began replicat- ing cats and dogs. In October 2015, two litters of kittens were successfully delivered, followed a few months later by a Jack Russell terrier. With that delivery ViaGen became the first American company to offer pet cloning services in compliance with U.S. regulatory standards and humane pet-care practices, according to a release from that company. ViaGen has lowered the price for a dog clone to $50,000 and for a cat a mere $25,000. (Apparently felines are easier to clone.) So now that you know a dog can be cloned, just how do they do it? The first step would be collecting and preserving genetic material from the dog who will be cloned. Using a kit from ViaGen, a veterinarian takes a skin punch biopsy using local anesthesia so the dog feels no WE’RE NOT JUST TIRES! We do... Alignments, Brakes, Shocks, Struts, CV Joints, U Joints, Axle Shafts, Drivelines, & Tire Siping ...not only cars, but trailers, too! DAVIS TIRE 541-549-1026 Serving Sisters Since 1962 188 W. Sisters Park Dr. In Sisters Industrial Park across from SnoCap Mini Storage Gather G Ga a th t h er ther the e r a at t Th e C Co Cottonwood o tt t t ton onwo onw on n w wo o od o d f for or r Seasonal S eason all Specials S pe p ci cial alss and an d Lo Loca Local call Fare Fa re gluten-free/vegetarian l f / i options i available il bl Opon Th urs.-Tuos., 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. 403 E. Hood Avo. | 541.549.2699 pain, ViaGen representatives say. And then the samples are sent to the company to produce a cell line. The cells are frozen and stored in liq- uid nitrogen and can remain viable indefinitely. In other words, they can be used for cloning right away or can be stored for decades. Now that pet cloning and genetic preservation are available in the United States and the prices have dropped, veterinary clients may begin asking about the services. However, some practitio- ners have serious concerns about the ethics of cloning companion animals. The first considerations are about the embryos that are created and the animals being used as surrogates for those embryos. According to James A. Serpell, professor of ethics and animal welfare at the University of Pennsylvania S c h o o l o f Ve t e r i n a r y Medicine, there is a signifi- cant loss of embryos. And if you’ve watched sci-fi movies, you might think that a clone of your dog will be a perfect replica, but it’s not that simple. Cloning won’t give you your pet back, not exactly. Melain Rodriguez, client service manager for ViaGen pointed out that a cloned pet won’t necessarily be an exact match to the original pet, not even in appearance. Basically, there are no guarantees when it comes to a cloned pet’s per- sonality. However, feedback from clients from ViaGen say that personality and tempera- ment are very similar in their cloned animals. “One thing that can change in a cloned animal is the patterning of the fur,” Rodriguez said in an inter- view in Dogster magazine. So, if a black dog with Year-round FIREWOOD SALES — Kindling — — — SISTERS FOREST PRODUCTS 541-410-4509 SistersForestProducts.com 17 SEA CRITTERS: Plastic pollution served as stepping stones Continued from page 7 PHOTO BY JODI SCHNEIDER MCNAMEE Nubia, the cloned Jack Russell terrier. white spots is the original dog, the cloned puppy would be black with white spots, but those white spots can be in a different location. As for concerns that a cloned pet may be less healthy because of any g e n e t i c a b n o r m a l i t y, Rodriguez reported no com- plications. The company pre- dicts normal lifespans for the canine and feline offspring it has produced. Now that cloning is no longer just livestock, the odds of meeting someone with a cloned pet are going up. But just because there’s a new technology of clon- ing pets, doesn’t mean you should do it. According to Rodriguez, they will be cloning excep- tional therapy dogs and working dogs, such as drug- sniffing dogs. Even though working dogs or service dogs are typi- cally spayed and neutered young, an outstanding dog’s genes are valuable. And clon- ing offers a way to use those genes for future generations. ViaGen is now involved in cloning two endangered spe- cies related to cows: the gaur and the banteng. jack native to the western Pacific, Carlton said. Some of the fish are still alive in an Oregon aquarium. Earlier, an entire fishing ship — the Sai sho-Maru — arrived intact with five of the same 6-inch fish swimming around inside. Co-author Gregory Ruiz, a Smithsonian marine ecolo- gist, is especially interested in a Japanese parasite in the gills of mussels. Elsewhere in the world, these parasites have taken root and hurt oyster and mussel harvests and they hadn’t been seen before on the West Coast. The researchers note another huge factor in this flo- tilla: plastics. Decades ago, most of the debris would have been wood and that would have degraded over the long ocean trip, but now most of the debris — buoys, boats, crates and pal- lets — are made of plastic, and that survives, Carlton said. And so the hitchhikers survive, too. “It was the plastic debris that allowed new species to survive far longer than we ever thought they would,” Carlton said. James Byers, a marine ecologist at the University of Georgia in Athens, who wasn’t part of the study, praised the authors for their detective work. He said in an email that the migration was an odd mix of a natural trigger and human aspects because of the plastics. “The fact that communities of organisms survived out in the open ocean for long time periods (years in some cases) is amazing,” he wrote. Dr. Thomas R. Rheuben General, Cosmetic, Implant and Family Dentistry ~ Over 22 years Serving Sisters ~ We are preferred providers for Delta Dental PPO and Premier, MODA, Advantage, Pacifi c Source, Cigna and the V.A. 541-549-0109 | 304 W. Adams Ave. | Sisters
