Animal cloning shouldn't be feared, insists boss of Whitchurch equestrian business

Tullis Matson, managing director of Stallion AI Services near Whitchurch, believes people should move on from the controversy surrounding cloning and said the technology used in the process is helping produce happy and healthy animals.

Stallion AI was founded in 2000 and is using technology for genetic preservation and cloning animals such as horses, dogs and cats, via sister company Gemini Genetics.

In a chat with podcast, The Graveyard Shift, Mr Matson said: “The cloning side can be a bit controversial – like when Dolly the sheep was born in 1996, but things have moved on.

“There are hundreds of animals being cloned – cats, dogs and horses. There is quite a long waiting list. When you lose a pet that can be very traumatic. Knowing there is a little bit of them still alive helps with the grieving process.

“The cloned dog we have here started her life as a cell and now she is a perfect, healthy animal. It is incredible to see what we can do.”

Stallion AI is also a global centre of excellence for equine semen collection, processing, storage and distribution. In the past two decades its specialist team has carried out in excess of 20,000 collections from over 1,200 stallions.

A significant proportion of these are rare breeds requiring technologies to save them from extinction, in addition to highly valuable sport horses. This is where sister company Gemini Genetics was established - to enable whole genetic profile preservation of significant equines via a small skin sample.

Mr Matson said: “The whole beauty about having horse genetics is shipping them around the world. Back in 2012 we sent about £70,000 worth of semen around the world to about seven different countries. Last year we sent £2.5 million to £3 million to 22 different countries.

“Now with Gemini Genetics, we can save the whole genetic profile of rare, endangered and elite equines, and produce exact genetic replicas for breed preservation or for sport and performance, via cloning. And this is all from a skin sample, rather than semen. It's quite amazing to be generating new life in this way.”

Mr Matson has also set up the charity Nature's SAFE to preserve the cells of endangered species around the world.

“In one tank alone here, we have 166 different species which is quite incredible," he said. "Southern white rhinos, Asian elephants and I think we did a Komodo dragon as well.

“We really believe this could be the last chance attempt for saving some species from extinction.

“There are about six or seven million species on the planet. There’s one million at risk, 40,000 critically endangered and roughly 50 to 100 species a day go extinct which is quite frightening. This is another way of conserving them.

“We are just banking them down at the moment, but in theory they can be brought back to life in 20, 30 or 1,000 years when these species are on the brink of extinction. We are really proud of what we are doing here.

“People can say it is messing with nature, but I think that has been said already. If we are at the cliff edge with many of these species, we have got to embrace every technology that is out there.”

The podcast can be heard at shropshirepr.co.uk