鈥淚 JUST don鈥檛 think it鈥檚 right to produce a new organism just to be a pet,鈥� state fish and game commissioner Sam Schuchat told reporters. 鈥淭o me, this seems like an abuse of the power we have over life.鈥�
It was with these solemn words that California said no to the GloFish this month. The creature, a zebrafish with a coral gene that makes it fluoresce red, is already selling well in Florida. From January, it will be available in most other US states as well. In Taiwan, meanwhile, a zebrafish called Night Pearl, which glows in the dark courtesy of an added jellyfish gene, has been in shops since June. The age of genetically modified pets has dawned.
OK, so it is still early days. The methods needed to create GM cats or dogs are proving difficult and expensive to develop. But given the pace of genetics research, it is only a matter of time before we will be able to tinker with the genomes of all kinds of creatures. Glowing mice and luminescent rabbits already exist. More shades of zebrafish? No problem. And the future possibilities are astounding. Going for blue in your interior design? Why not a blue dog to match? Some researchers are even trying to reverse evolution and create dinosaurs, by switching on long-dormant genes in birds. Just imagine what some people would pay for a pet dinosaur.
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Born-again pterodactyls are of course a long shot, but a string of humbler GM pets will reach the marketplace. So how should we respond? One gut reaction will be: 鈥淲here can I get one?鈥� Another, like Schuchat鈥檚, is 鈥淚t鈥檚 wrong and unnatural鈥�. Neither is helpful. The 鈥減laying god with nature鈥� objection in particular doesn鈥檛 wash, because we have been manipulating animals for thousands of years through conventional breeding. So let鈥檚 cast it aside and look at the factors that ought to enter our calculations.
Animal welfare, for starters. Unrestrained genetic modification certainly could lead to the creation of pets with characteristics that cause suffering. Anyone who doubts the power of gene tweaking should reflect on some of the truly bizarre mutant fruit flies that have been created in labs. Flies with an extra set of wings, or with extra genitals instead of eyes. In the not too distant future we may be able to perform similar feats with mammals. Fancy a six-legged dog, anyone?
It鈥檚 hard to believe anyone would want such a monster, but just look at what is out there already. Goldfish that can barely swim, hairless cats, bulldogs with deformed jaws鈥� we鈥檝e created plenty of Frankenpets already, using nothing more frightening than conventional breeding. Which is worse: adding a gene to a rabbit to make it glow in the dark, or keeping a Tennessee fainting goat as a pet, an animal with a mutation that makes it collapse whenever it is startled, as proud owners no doubt delight in demonstrating?
Used wisely, genetic modification could help put right some of the excesses of conventional breeding. For instance, some researchers hope to use it to correct the hip problems that plague some breeds of dog.
It鈥檚 not laws to ban GM pets that are needed, but laws that prevent the creation by any means of pets whose genes condemn them to suffer. In the US, there are no federal laws covering the welfare of 鈥渃ompanion animals鈥�. And while the European Convention for the Protection of Pet Animals does call on breeders not to create undesirable characteristics, most countries, including the UK, have not signed up.
The other big question about GM pets is what if they get away? Many exotic pets have already created problems: Burmese pythons now lurk in the Everglades, for instance. And domestic animals don鈥檛 even need to escape to mess with biodiversity. In the remote highlands of Africa, herdsmen鈥檚 dogs are wiping out the endangered Ethiopian wolf simply by interbreeding.
Companies argue that there is less reason to worry about GM pets because the modifications that make them desirable would reduce their survival prospects in the wild. The GloFish wastes energy fluorescing and would be highly visible to predators, for instance.
But added traits needn鈥檛 always be enfeebling. Modifying tropical fish to enable them to survive in unheated tanks has obvious appeal for the pet trade, and obvious risks. And glibly assuming less fit means less threat could be a mistake. The so-called 鈥淭rojan gene鈥� theory suggests that a modified and less fit animal can still drive its wild relatives to extinction if it is better at competing for mates. Even though most offspring would die young, those that survive would father most of the next generation, most of which would also die young. And so on, until a species is no more.
Fortunately, there is a pretty good way of ensuring GM pets never run wild. Regulators simply need to insist that their biotech creators make the animals sterile and get them to agree to accept liability for any ecological damage resulting from errors.
GM pets are an emotive subject. But our decisions should not be based on romantic notions of what is natural any more than on naive enthusiasm. What we need are policies that identify the risks and deal with them.