Cloning a Breed Apart ... but Imagine Possibilities

One of the problems with breeding horses is that the stallions, as much as you think they’d like their retirement plans, are not always cooperative.

According to Baltimore Sun sportswriter John Eisenberg’s book on Native Dancer, even the greatest stud of them all played hard to get, biting the finger off one groom’s hand and then biting his next groom on the arm.

With breeders in town for their Cup on Saturday at Santa Anita, this is probably a sore subject. But, thanks to the miracles of modern science, there is another method of producing, or should we say reproducing, thoroughbreds.

Word came out of Moscow, Idaho, in May that a joint project between the University of Idaho and Utah State had for the first time cloned a member of the equine family, a mule named Idaho Gem.

Two weeks later, scientists at the Laboratory of Reproductive Technology in Cremona, Italy, announced that they had cloned a horse. They named her Prometea, for Prometheus, who, according to Greek mythology, stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans.

Associated Press reports that researchers at Texas A&M; are expecting the birth of another cloned horse next month.

Consider the possibilities.

When the movie “Seabiscuit” was released last summer, horseracing officials at tracks around the country hoped that it would inspire a resurgence in the sport’s popularity.

But who needs a movie about Seabiscuit when you can have Seabiscuit himself, or at least a reasonable facsimile?

If you cloned War Admiral too, we could have a rematch race.

Wouldn’t you like to see Affirmed versus Alydar again?

Secretariat versus Man O’War?

Or take the best horses of all time -- Man O’War, Secretariat, Native Dancer, Citation, Affirmed, Seattle Slew, etc. -- and put them in a race against each other.

Call it the Cloners’ Cup Classic.

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This could be very good news for the owners of Funny Cide.

The horse was castrated, which made him a more focused racehorse. He won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness. But it ended the possibility that there would be little Funny Cides pitter-pattering around the stables. Or at least that’s what his owners thought at the time.

But, through cloning, they can continue to enjoy watching him race and someday could see his children and grandchildren race. All they have to do is send a little of his DNA to the nearest laboratory.

The cost of cloning a horse is $250,000, said Dr. Dirk Vanderwall of the University of Idaho’s department of animal and veterinary science.

“It’s going to be an expensive proposition,” he said. “But, like everything else, this is going to come down over time.”

That will make it a bargain, considering that the stud fee for Storm Cat, the highest-priced stallion ever, is $500,000. Stud fees are $100,000 for recently retired Empire Maker and Mineshaft, terrific horses but untested in this department.

Of course, just because you clone Secretariat doesn’t mean you’re going to have another Secretariat.

“There is no guarantee that the clone will perform and behave as the original animal,” Vanderwall said, pointing out that the surrogate mare also influences the clone.

But the breeders here will tell you that is no different from their business. Their motto is “mate the best to the best and hope for the best.”

Environment -- nature versus nurture -- also plays a role.

“There’s a geneticist at the University of Kentucky who says, ‘If you had 10 Secretariat clones racing against each other, they wouldn’t finish in a dead heat,’ ” said Bob Curran, vice president for corporate communications for the Jockey Club.

“Even if you have an exact duplicate of Secretariat, you’re not going to have Lucien Lauren training him and Ron Turcotte riding him.”

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As intriguing as the discussion might be, it is at this particular time moot.

Curran emphasized that the Jockey Club has specific rules concerning what constitutes a thoroughbred, directing me to the organization’s Web site, which says, “To be eligible for registration, a foal must be the result of a stallion’s breeding with a broodmare.”

The Jockey Club’s definition of breeding is explicitly detailed. It does not include “artificial insemination, embryo transfer or transplant, cloning or any other form of genetic manipulation.”

In other words, Curran said, the Jockey Club, as old-fashioned as it might seem, wants to know that both parents were in the room together.

“We’re trying to protect the integrity of the breed,” he said.

If you want to see clones on the track, you’ll have to watch mule racing. The American Mule Racing Assn. has no rules against cloning. In fact, a wealthy mule racing enthusiast was the primary benefactor for the University of Idaho-Utah State project that produced Idaho Gem.

Until this week, I didn’t even know mules raced, although, in retrospect, it seems likely that I’ve bet on a few.

Randy Harvey can be reached at randy.harvey@latimes.com.