Cloned sniffer dogs begin duties

[formercia]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8158097.stm



Cloned sniffer dogs at Seoul's Incheon International Airport on July 17
The Labrador retrievers are genetically identical

South Korea's customs service says it has deployed the "world's first cloned sniffer dogs" to check for drugs at its main airport and border crossings.

Six puppies cloned from a Canadian-born sniffer dog in late 2007 have reported for duty after completing a 16-month training programme.

The clones are all called Toppy, a combination of "tomorrow" and "puppy".

The customs agency says clones help to lower crime-fighting costs as it is difficult to find good sniffer dogs.

--snip--

[LWolf]

1. Lowers cost?

The process of cloning, then training, is cheaper than using dogs that weren't cloned? Cloning is cheaper than breeding?

[Buzz Clik]

2. I like the name -- Toppy. As if the Korean words work out that way.

This article smells like bullshit.

[sam sarrha]

3. you have to train a lot of dogs before you find one that can do the job

[LWolf]

4. Of course, you have to train all the cloned dogs, too. nt

[sam sarrha]

5. i'm saying a minuscule amount of dogs turn out to be good sniffers. then you have to get rid of tho

[LWolf]

6. Of course.

So you wouldn't invest in training dogs that didn't have the pedigree, or couldn't pass a preliminary "sniffer" check before going into training.