Cloning?

[slumdog]

I've always said that if I had the money/facilities/etc I would have Gam cloned (unlikely lol) Been reading a few articles on it as I find it fascinating, especially in a competition horse with nature v nurture theory. If money/facilities/time etc were no object, would you do it? Just interested to hear peoples thoughts.

 

[YorksG]

If I could have cloned the Old Appy, I would have. She was beautiful moved fantasticaly, BUT was dreadfully behaved when we got her and was always over opinionated. I would have loved to have started with her as a blank page and seen what she could have been.

 

[windand rain]

I think it rather depends on expectation you cannot clone a super star as its life experiences give it a lot of its talent and vagaries however you could still end up with a very good animal with talent and the same conformation. You will obviously start with a blank page but often it is the writing on the old page that makes the horse who and what it is and no one can entirely replicate it. Would I do it money allowing maybe but only because I adore my old mare and it would be lovely to have her young again but then again in spite of owning her all her life my experiences would still be different now

 

[Mrs G]

Me and hubby have always said we would clone our lad if (when!?) we win the lottery! Be interesting to see how he would have turned out if he'd been privately owned from the start instead of raised in the racing industry.

 

[*hic*]

No, you won't get your horse back.

 

[Wagtail]

Absolutely no. I adored my late mare. She was the most special animal in my life. She could never be replaced, but the thought of cloning her fills me with disgust. I would find it incredibly creepy and wrong. She was a very bright flame and it would be disrespectful to life itself to try to clone her.

 

[FinnishLapphund]

No, I can't imagine that I would clone one of my pets, even if I had the money to do it. I want the individual back, not a fake copy of them, and no matter how much you can copy them genetically, I don't think that you can clone their souls.

Besides, if I had e.g. cloned my first dog when she died, then that means that I wouldn't have bought Jonna, who I also love and adore, and wouldn't want to live without.

About cloning competition horses, personally, I can't help but feel that cloning seems like stagnating evolution. I would perhaps be for cloning, if it was used for helping endangered species like the Sunda (/Javan) rhinoceros to survive, but otherwise, I don't see much point in it.

Hypothetically, what if we in the future have show jumping classes with e.g. 10 Milton clones, 10 Gladstone clones, 5 Jappeloup clones, and 5 Boomerang clones. The originals was brilliant and charismatic horses, but would it really be a step forward for show jumping? I don't think so.

 

[Mrs G]

I'm suprised how vehemently against it some people are - why is it any different from breeding from a well beloved mare? My thinking is I'd be planning on keeping the foal for myself, but with the guarantee he would make the height/colour/conformation etc I'm expecting. It never occured to me that I'd be cloning his soul or personality - that's impossible - it would be a different horse with a different upbringing.... and its all hypothetical anyway (probably!)

 

[fburton]

The prospect doesn't fill me with disgust (or even discust). Maybe that's because I don't believe that animals (including we humans) have souls. However, I would be concerned the cloned horse wouldn't be like the one I knew before, because he would have to have the same life experiences as well as the same genes for him to be the same - and that simply isn't possible. And if he wasn't the same, wouldn't that feel rather odd and unsettling?

Even if he was the same in every way, I would be concerned that somehow it wouldn't be good for me to have that 'luxury'. Better to live with fond memories, even if they are tinged with sorrow at the loss of something special.

 

[Sukistokes2]

From what I have read of cloning it does not mean that you get an exact copy anyhow. Genes can recombine in different ways so the result may not even look like the animal you have lost, just similar, also their characters will vary because no matter what genes that have, they are individuals with their own life experiences.
I would say no to this, mainly because variety is the spice of life and while I miss the animals of my past I also adore the ones I have now.

 

[*hic*]

I'm not vehemently against it. I worry that people will think that they will get an exact copy of their previous animal. They won't. I also suspect there are more problems to come out with it which will need to be overcome.

 

[Equi]

I don't like the idea, because i enjoy the time it takes getting to know a new animal. I think if i had the same kind of animal over and over again it would be a little boring.

 

[crabbymare]

The thing with cloning is that you do not get a replica of the horse so they can come out different in conformation and colour to the original and obviously the life experiences will be different as well

 

[Equi]

Not much of a clone then is it? :/

 

[Wagtail]

Clones are genetically identical, therefore they will look pretty much the same. They will not be a different colour, but the white patches, if they have them will not be exactly the same. So original may have four white stockings and a blaze and clone may have four white socks and a star and snip for example. But the base colour will be the same. They will also have the same general height and build unless they receive vastly different nutrition and environments.

 

[crabbymare]

Not much of a clone then is it? :/

I agree and having seen the video of the Rusty clone its not something I would be looking at. will be interesting to see the ones that are cloned when more of them come through to competing and how well they do go when they mature

 

[Equi]

Is it allowed in showing? Surely the point is to produce new better horses. There's always a better horse. If they're all cloned would it not just plateau?

 

[slumdog]

Some great points here

The way I look at it is its a great way to 'breed' from my gelding. I don't see it as Gambler number 2, a replacement for the one I already have, but I would see him as almost the sire, rather than an identical twin or a clone. Much like breeding from a well loved mare

 

[Spring Feather]

No it's not something that would interest me. I do breed from my much loved mares and I occasionally keep some of their offspring, that is more meaningful to me than cloning.

 

[Arizahn]

I've always said that if I had the money/facilities/etc I would have Gam cloned (unlikely lol) Been reading a few articles on it as I find it fascinating, especially in a competition horse with nature v nurture theory. If money/facilities/time etc were no object, would you do it? Just interested to hear peoples thoughts.

If money etc were no issue? Yes, absolutely. And I'd want numerous copies so that the Nature/Nurture debate could be fully studied and documented over the course of their lifetimes. It would be fascinating, imo. But it would have to be a situation where I had the time and resources to do it properly. That being said, I wouldn't regard it as being the same animal at all; it would be a group of animals that happened to be genetically identical.

 

[cobgoblin]

If you clone any living thing you are using aged cells to produce a new animal. The telomeres on the chromosomes will already be shortened as in old age. Doesn't seem very fair to me.

 

[Lolita]

Nope not in a million years.