In the 70's a gentleman named Pat Jones was crossing Buffalo on Charolais Cattle to create a White Buffalo, in the picture above, at the Buena Vista Exotic Animal Paradise in Missouri. The picture below I took in 1981 when I visited and Mr. Jones excitedly said, "you said I couldn't do it, but I have a pure white buffalo. I kindly said, "It's not "pure" Mr. Jones, because you crossed it on cattle." It got pretty heated because he couldn't convince me it was "pure" and I couldn't convince him it wasn't. He almost threw me off the place. He always referred to himself as a "refined breeder" of animals. I suggest "refined breeding" means turning them loose in the woods, and letting them go at it.
The Heck's, I suggest were more "refined breeders" then Mr. Jones would ever be. With the Tarpan they came close, but the "modern" Tapan has a long flat mane, and the "original" had a short upright mane. Their "modern" Auroch, is also considerably smaller then the "original", and the Hecks put in a magnificent effort in trying to "recreate". Did they not have enough time, or can you not recreate it from other species?
Monday, May 19, 2008
Recreating a lost specs as apposed to cloning. Is it practical and is the representative a true version of the extinct?
Posted by
Wade G. Burck
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I'm tempted to call this illusionary conservation. Taxonomy has been turned upside down by DNA sequencing. Turns out that classification according to strict morphology wasn't as accurate as generations of taxonomists imagined. As such, attempting to recreate a species by selectively breeding for morphological traits could in theory result in an animal that waddles, and swims and flies and quacks and looks in every way like a duck, but it ain't a duck at all. Most of the attempts at such things assume some shared genetics with the extinct target species. But breeding based strictly on physical/morphological standards probably misses much of the original blueprint. To really pull this off, assuming it can be pulled off at all we'd need a pretty clear genetic picture of the extinct species -- not impossible, but certainly costly. Recreating an extinct species through cloning might be rather more practical.
I think a lot about the Passenger Pigeon. Certainly one of the most common American birds in its day. And there's plenty of genetic material available in preserved specimens -- and perhaps some living genetic material in some domestic doves and pigeons. But the Passenger Pigeon was strictly hunted to death. The pigeons lived in groups of tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of birds. A certain population threshold was required to trigger reproductive behavior. A flock with five hundred young, healthy birds had no cue to mate and nest. Let's say we could come up with a close copy of a Passenger Pigeon through selective breeding -- would it be the real thing if the resulting animals didn't behave in the same way?
Ben
Ben,
Very well put. You don't want to give people the wrong impression of a "Mud Show Guy." You all are supposed to be drunken, toothless, drug addled geeks, who bit the head's off of chickens. That's if you are a stereotyping moron.
I have always had a similar feeling towards all the different colors of "tigers." I can accept the White from a "occurring" standpoint, and even I philosophically have a problem with the introduction of "Tony" blood. I can patch by thinking the original needed genetic help, but it is a week patch. Maybe the "white" was supposed to genetically breed it's self into extinction.
I think the keeping of Snowflakes stones on ice, is some of the most exciting news I have heard in a long time. That is very acceptable to me, and I can hardly wait for the day, when that White Legend reappears.
Wade
Snowflake was incredible.
We could add another wrinkle to the discussion if we wanted to. White tigers as a "population" are a pretty good example of "managing" a wild population toward a specific end or goal. Looking at the stretch of history I sometimes wonder about other species that may have been "managed" to some extent over the last ten thousand years. With no knowledge of genetics, humans have been pretty savvy when it comes to breeding for specific traits for a long time.
So...
Let's look at elephants in India. Depending on who does the reckoning elephants have been worked in domesticity for 4000-7000 years on the subcontinent. Clearly elephants aren't truly domestic because mahouts cut work animals from "wild" herds. BUT the "wild" groups were all very closely observed -- "managed" as it were. And I wonder if reproductive individuals were culled either to encourage traits observed in the remaining individuals, or to discourage traits observed in animals that were killed. To me it seems likely. If that's the case in conserving what remains of wild populations several generations removed from that kind of historical "management" I wonder if we aren't looking at behaviors somewhat more "feral" than what we would have seen elephants a hundred years ago?
Ben
Ben,
Absolutely. I make that point often when people try to point out how much better the wild is for a captive animals. What is "wild?" I don't think it is a managed, maintained population on a game preserve some place in Africa, India, or our own Yellowstone Park. You also addressed another oft asked question, "where have all the big tusked male gone to?" The assumption is that the few magnificent specimens were "trophy hunted" since colonial times, and the lesser tusked individuals were left to propagate smaller tusks.
Wade
Wade, it's always fascinating to look at the historical record and speculate on just how much "contact" with humans it takes to influence behaviors not just in individual animals but in entire populations. Not much it would appear with some... Particularly large predatory animals. Reading Merriweather Lewis it would seem that every grizzly in the west encountered by the expedition was highly aggressive -- and that matchesdescriptions by Native Americans and the bear experience in California. But it only took a few decades to change that. By the 1860's the remaining grizzlies were avoiding human contact. The most aggressive or aggressively defensive animals had been killed off and the survivors had learned/adapted. The relatively small number of bear attacks in Glacier, Yellowstone, etc. illustrate that change pretty well. Looking at British colonial records, reading Jim Corbett etc. I'm always struck by just how rare "maneaters" really are. Historically far more common among ursids than felids I would venture.
The only way I can explain that is speculating that at some point in human pre-history highly preadtory cats were hunted down and cats "learned." That ability to learn, or adapt, or select against aggression is pretty uniquely mammalian.
Ben
Ben,
BINGO!!!! You hit on animal behavior modification/learning/
training, and may not have realized it. I discovered it when I was 7 and my mule colt bolted and ran down the barn heading for the open door on the South end. Just as he reached the end, the top half of the dutch door blew shut, and hit him square between the eyes, and knocked him backward. For 3 months I had to take him out the North door, until after 3 months of careful rewarding I was able to convince him that the South end wasn't going to kill him. People who have trained animals for longer then my self have never learned that. They are inconsistent with their correction/discipline, depending on whether somebody is looking, whether they are angry at something else, and often just because they don't know any better.
Before anybody "misconceive" what "Animal Training" is, there is only one instance, and one instance only, when "hell is coming, and it is riding a white horse". And that is the precise moment when one animal decides he is going to kill that other one. Unless you are instantly ready, and you are convinced that you can stop him, he will attempt it the rest of his life. You are either going to or you are not, but if you are inconsistent, 10 years later he will still be laughing at you and giving you the finger. I know a "trainer" of 35 years who when people describe their act, describe it as "inconsistent." I have watched this individual, who doesn't know that you can train tigers without force, and wants people to think they are "gentle" , practice many times. Example. They had a tiger who has tried to kill every new animal introduced to the act, often times never using the new individual, just trying a different one. I watched this tiger being told 10 times to sit done one day, and they were afraid to make it SIT DOWN, finally they got so frustrated, they gave the tiger a sharp "clout". They had wanted to show me they were "gentle" and over reacted out of frustration. Ten years prior if they had followed the very first command of SIT DOWN, with that "clout" that I saw that day, chances are that tiger would have been a useful citizen, and not spent 10 years trying to maim or kill new tigers.
When people ask me how smart is an animal, I respond, "instant smart, or instant stupid depending on how instant smart or instant stupid the trainer is." If you don't intend on following through, to tell them to do something, better for them if you just ignore it. They will never respect, which is love and understanding combined, you. Very few animal/individuals need to be told twice. Thats why the man eaters, Ursids or otherwise say,"we don't need this trouble, let's go away." ANIMALS ARE CREATURES OF HABIT, GOOD HABITS OR BAD DEPEND ON MAN.
Brilliant point, Ben
Regards,
Wade
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