'Absolutely worth it': Meet the B.C. woman who paid $50,000 to clone her dead cat
Kris Stewart has her hands full with two rambunctious, 10-week-old kittens.
“They’re very aggressive, sassy, bold kittens, and that’s exactly what Bear was like,” said Stewart from her home in Kelowna.
Bear was Stewart’s beloved ragdoll cat, who was killed two years ago.
“Bear died in a car versus cat situation. Bear was street-wise until the moment he wasn’t street-wise. So that was very sad,” said Stewart, who blamed herself for letting Bear outside.
“I knew I wanted to clone him, because I tried cloning one of my dogs about three or four years prior to that, and I still had the instructions for how to send the cell samples down to Viagen in Texas.”
Viagen is a U.S. company that clones cats and dogs. A video on its YouTube channel explains it takes cells from a pet that an owner wants cloned, and inserts them into the nucleus of a female animal’s egg. In what it calls a “patented process,” the egg and cell join together and an embryo starts to grow. The embryos are then transferred to a surrogate mother, who will give birth to the cloned puppies or kittens.
“It took five embryo transfers before a successful pregnancy was achieved,” said Stewart. “So I knew kittens were born when Viagen called me in late January to tell me the embryo transfer they did in November resulted in kittens being born January the 10th.”
Last week, she flew to New York, where Viagen presented her with two identical kittens created at its breeding facility, who are both genetic clones of Bear.
“I can’t tell them apart,” Stewart said. “Personality wise, I would have to say they’re both, at this point, identical to Bear. Because they make some very brazen decisions, they have a bit of a swagger, just like Bear did.”
While the decision to clone Bear was primarily an emotional one, Stewart said she is "a bit of a science geek."
"This interests me from a science perspective too, the fact that this can actually be done," she said.
The business owner says she is is telling her story so other Canadians know this option exists.
“I would suggest to pet owners if you have a cherished pet that you strongly consider getting your pet’s cells preserved,” said Stewart, who added the cells can be taken while the pet is still alive or right after death, but those cells need to be sent away to be cryogenically frozen immediately.
Pet owners who decide to proceed with the cloning need deep pockets. The cost to create the kittens Stewart has named Bear Bear and Honey Bear? Around C$50,000.
“Was it worth it? Absolutely worth it,” she said. “I am so relieved the waiting is over with, so relieved to have two little gaffers that look just like Bear. So I am pretty happy with the end results.”
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Parents of infant who died in wrong-way crash on Ontario's Hwy. 401 were in same vehicle
Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit has released new details about a wrong-way collision in Whitby on Monday night that claimed the lives of four people.
Three Quebec men from same family father hundreds of children
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
B.C. mayor stripped of budget, barred from committees over Indigenous residential schools book
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
OPP's mandatory alcohol screening during traffic stops 'not acceptable': CCLA
A spike in impaired driving-related collisions has caused Ontario’s provincial police to begin enforcing mandatory alcohol screening (MAS) at all traffic stops in the Greater Toronto Area -- a move one civil rights group says is ‘not acceptable.’
Maple Leafs down Bruins 2-1 to force Game 7
William Nylander scored twice and Joseph Woll made 22 saves as the Toronto Maple Leafs downed the Boston Bruins 2-1 on Thursday to force Game 7 in their first-round series.
Jurors in Trump hush money trial hear recording of pivotal call on plan to buy affair story
Jurors in the hush money trial of Donald Trump heard a recording Thursday of him discussing with his then-lawyer and personal fixer a plan to purchase the silence of a Playboy model who has said she had an affair with the former president.
Southern Alberta store broken into by burly black bear
Staff at a small southern Alberta office supply store were shocked to find someone had broken into the business last week, but they were even more confused when they discovered the culprit was a bear.
Captain sentenced to 4 years for criminal negligence in fiery deaths of 34 aboard scuba boat
A federal judge on Thursday sentenced a scuba dive boat captain to four years in custody and three years supervised release for criminal negligence after 34 people died in a fire aboard the vessel.
New scam targets Canada Carbon Rebate recipients
Fake text message and email campaigns trying to get money and information out of unsuspecting Canadian taxpayers have started circulating, just months after the federal government rebranded the carbon tax rebate the Canada Carbon Rebate.