A Little Help From My Friends

Dr. George Church and his brilliant scientific team (depicted in Woolly) aside, I have a feeling that we are still a ways away from watching our first woolly mammoth plod across the Siberian steppes.  Still, that which seems hard to believe now may be achieved one day - much of the technology that we employ now, from air travel to the wireless computer that I write this post from - would have seemed like magic to earlier generations.  The pioneering researchers that are working on recreating the mammoth are themselves standing on the shoulders of the scientists before them who pioneered artificial insemination (or, since there really is nothing artificial about the end result, assisted reproduction).

Like most technologies used in zoo animals, AI was crafted with domestic animals (and people) in mind.  The technology isn't exactly new - the Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani artificially inseminated a dog back in 1780.  The technology did not really develop until the middle of the last century.

In animal agriculture, artificial insemination is useful in allowing a male to impregnate a greater number of females than he might be able to manage naturally, or to allow for the transportation of just the semen instead of the whole animal.  This can be especially valuable for animals in which a breeding male can be large and potentially aggressive, such as a dairy bull.

Among zoo animals, the benefits of AI are similar to those in agriculture, although perhaps even more pronounced.  If you think moving a prized bull from female to female could be challenging, imagine moving an orca - which is in part why SeaWorld has relied on it for maintaining its orca program.    "Nakai," born at SeaWorld San Diego in 2001 to mother "Kasatka," is believed to be the first orca conceived through AI.  Though whales had been bred before then, it's certainly much easier and less risky to move just the part you need.  If an animal is very large, or delicate, or maybe not in the best health for a long trip, it can be much easier to just move semen.  

This is especially true for animals which might have perfectly viable genes, but aren't able to breed for other reasons.  For example, "Kuma" was an ocelot at the Beardsley Zoo in Connecticut, who had lost a leg in a violent conflict with another ocelot.  She could still breed, but she would be at a major disadvantage in another introduction with a male ocelot.  Physically and behaviorally, she would not be up to the task of breeding - motherhood, however, she could handle.  She was artificially inseminated using a donation from "Ozzie," a male from the Salisbury Zoo.  The same techniques would have worked for an animal who was physically fit but had some behavioral hang-up that prevented breeding, such as being hand-reared and imprinted on humans.

"Kuma's" story goes to show - for many animals, especially solitary wild animals, sex is one of the most dangerous aspects of life.  It puts animals in extremely close contact, and it doesn't take much for something to go wrong.  I've heard first-hand horror stories of big cats (clouded leopards are especially notorious) and bears killing mates with seemingly no provocation during breeding introductions.  Even among relatively social species, it can get dicey - I once had to physically rip two capybara off one another after the female decided that she wanted to try and kill the male that we were introducing her to.  Both survived the encounter with minor injuries, and I managed not to have my face bitten off.

Given the option of having a "contact-less pickup," to use one of the buzz phrases of this summer, I can't say I wouldn't.