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and then growing the cells in the laboratory, and storing those
cells until it’s time to clone.
‘We then take an egg from a donor mare, and we take out all the
genetic material that’s inside of that donor egg – so it’s a blank,
if you will,’ says Meeker. ‘We go over to the cell of that which we
want to clone and we insert that inside the egg. Then we fuse it shut
and use our special processes to jumpstart it to life, and after that
we incubate it. After 10 days, if it’s a viable embryo, we will
implant it into a surrogate mare.’
From that point, the process is much the same as any other
embryo transfer. ‘Our success rate is hovering around 85 per cent
now,’ says Meeker.
As it stands, there are some in the veterinary world who suspect
that clones won’t make strong animals and that they don’t live for
very long. To that, Meeker says, ‘An incorrect assumption is that
the clones are born old. In other words, you take a cell that’s from
an older animal and you put it into an egg, and the DNA would
have short telomeres [which is associated with ageing]. When
in reality, what happens is that when the egg decides to become
a living organism, it resets everything. So the horse is born just
like a regular baby horse. There’s no difference between it and
another brand-new baby horse.’
Except, maybe there is. Meeker believes in something called
‘cellular memory’, which hypothesises that an animal’s experiences
can be stored in individual cells. In polo terms, this could mean
that clones are easier to train for the sport.
‘We see evidence of it every day,’ says Meeker. ‘The clones
of the same original all have the same personality and the same
idiosyncrasies. They all respond to the same training aids.’
Still, it does require training. The former 10-goaler Owen Rinehart,
who trained B09, says, ‘In horses, my experience is that although they
have the same abilities, they are still all individuals that have their own
personalities. They’re not robots that do everything exactly the same’.
Meeker agrees, ‘Had I given that same horse to the manager of
my cattle ranch, here in Texas, I doubt, seriously, that it would have
been a very good polo pony,’ he says of B09. ‘But if you give the
high-quality DNA to a decent trainer, such as Owen, his training will
allow the horse to express its natural ability. As a matter of fact,
I believe Owen said: “Alan, my job was to not mess this horse up.
She already knew what she was doing”.’
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