Would Bay Area residents consider cloning their pets?

Everyone has that one pet in life who they fall in love with at first sight — or first scratch.

For San Francisco resident Wyatt Boumedine, that was Zine, his white cat with a raccoon-like tail who would constantly growl, claw — and probably curse, if he could speak — at his owner. But Boumedine adored him. When Zine died from cancer in 2016, he was devastated.

But just before he passed, Boumedine discovered Texas-based ViaGen Pets, the only U.S-based firm to offer commercial cloning of dogs and cats. For $25,000 — the company’s price for cat cloning in 2016 — Boumedine could have a copy of his beloved pet.

The French native knew his bond with Zine couldn’t be replicated with another cat — even a genetically identical one. But, if there was some way he could keep a part of Zine alive with him, then perhaps cloning was worth a try.

Fast-forward one year later: Boumedine was able to obtain not one, but two clones of Zine through ViaGen. He appropriately named them Zine Jr. and Zinou — the latter combining Zine’s name with a French word to express affection.

“Every time I see them, I’m very happy,” he said. “I absolutely do not regret doing that.”

Boumedine joins a rising number of owners across the United States who are taking advantage of a 21st-century scientific marvel: pet cloning, or the process of creating an exact genetic replica of another organism. But there is a backlash, too, from those who think the practice is morally wrong.

Animal cloning was once considered to be a science-fiction fantasy, but then came Dolly the sheep in 1996 — the first mammal to be cloned from an adult cell — and suddenly the concept became an obtainable and profitable reality. After cloning Dolly, scientists began to expand their palette to include mice, cows and horses. But it was the cats and dogs, which are the most popular pets in the United Staes, that caught the public’s attention.

High-profile celebrities like Barbra Streisand and Paris Hilton began to get their pooches cloned — and dropped around $50,000 to do so. As the industry became more widely known, and the cloning technology more accessible, everyday pet owners like Boumedine considered paying the price.

The number of pet cloning requests has grown recently, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, according to ViaGen, which offers dog and cat cloning for $50,000. “That time spent at home during COVID provided more opportunities for our clients to continue building unique and special bonds with their beloved pets,” said spokesperson Lauren Aston.

But public opinion surrounding cloning animals has remained unchanged in the last 20 years. According to a 2023 Gallup Poll, 61% of Americans believe cloning animals is morally wrong, which is only 2% lower than it was in 2001. Their disapproval stems from factors including animal exploitation during the cloning process (a surrogate animal is used to birth the clone) and the ethics associated with producing a living creature through artificial means.

The cloning process is simple — sort of. First, tissue samples like pieces of skin or muscle are taken from a cat or dog. Scientists separate the tissue to extract the cells containing the pet’s genetic material. The DNA is then cryopreserved before being injected into an egg cell that creates the embryo. From there, the embryo — or several of them also containing the DNA — is implanted into a surrogate animal. About nine weeks later, the average term for a pregnancy for dogs and cats, the clone is born.

Usually, only one or even two embryos will come to term, any more than that is considered to be rare — just like how it is in real life, according to Ron Gillespie, owner of PerPetuate. Based in Massachusetts, PerPetuate is one of the world’s first pet genetic preservation companies that helped prepare Zine’s cells for cloning.

“It’s all about Mother Nature and the surrogate mother,” Gillespie said. “Wyatt was lucky; most clients are guaranteed one cloned puppy or kitten.”

Cloned animals may share the same genetic material as the original, but their environment also plays an important role in how their personalities will turn out, according to the National Human Genome Research Institute.

Boumedine said the twins are “95% similar” to Zine in behavior, but are more sociable because he owns other cats the pair can constantly play with, including their surrogate mother, who he adopted from ViaGen, and three other cats he adopted from a Redwood City shelter.

The difference serves as a reminder that the twins can’t truly replace Zine, who is forever memorialized in a painting that sits on Boumedine’s mantel, where all the other cats can see.

“It’s healthy they have little differences,” he said. “It’s good reminders they are clones, they are not my original cat.”

Although Boumedine was set on cloning Zine, others are hesitant to take that step. Julia Pedroza from San Francisco loved her two rescue dogs, Layla and Finnegan. When they both passed away a few years ago from cancer, Pedroza and her husband sent their tissues to PerPetuate to have the genetic material extracted and preserved. They pay a storage fee of $120 a year to hold the DNA in the company’s labs.

Pedroza said she won’t clone her dogs, citing ethical concerns with the procedure, but just knowing their DNA is saved and the option is available offers her peace of mind.

“I think losing a pet suddenly or slowly is devastating,” she said. “Knowing we could have another version of a Layla and Finnegan in the future, it provides some comfort.”

There was once a time when Bay Area residents didn’t have to consult with out-of-state companies for a cloned pet. In the early 2000s, Mill Valley-based BioArts International offered pet cloning services, partnering with a South Korean laboratory to do the actual cloning. In 2008, BioArts offered to clone dogs for the five highest bidders in a series of online auctions, with the opening bid starting at $100,000. Although all of the chosen bidders received their clones, the company shut its doors a year later, citing several reasons including a small market of people interested in cloning and concerns with animal welfare.

While some people would consider cloning their pets or preserving their DNA, others like Alisa Corstorphine are firmly against the idea.

The Alamo resident said she doesn’t understand why people want to clone their pets when local shelters are overflowing with animals in need.

“Bringing more animals into this world, when we can’t take care of the ones we got, just seems offensive and disgusting,” she said.

Corstorphine volunteers at the Feral Cat Foundation — a nonprofit where volunteers rescue cats in Alameda and Contra Costa counties — and handles a hotline where people can report stray kittens and cats. The calls have become numerous and heartbreaking in recent years, she said. Some cats have been dumped and abandoned in parking lots, pet stores and on the side of the road, battling infections or diseases. “It goes on and on,” she said.

These days local shelters are getting overwhelmed with animals; the U.S shelter population grew by nearly a quarter-million in 2023, according to a national database. There are a variety of factors at play — overbreeding of animals, people going back to work in-person who can no longer care for their pets, the rising cost of living and veterinarian care prices.

But those like Sunnyvale veterinarian Ekaterina Fedorova, who goes by the name Kate, believes the decision to clone a pet falls squarely on the owner’s shoulders.

At the Cherry Chase Pet Hospital in Sunnyvale where she works, Kate encounters clients who want to undergo the cloning process. They ask Kate to help take pieces of tissue from their pets so they can send the samples off to pet cloning companies. Kate doesn’t openly tell her clients about cloning, nor does she turn clients away when they ask for the samples.

“If people have money and technology offers it,” she said, “why not?”