Friday Dog

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$190,000 Cloned Dog

An American couple were so distraught at the prospect of losing their pet Labrador that they decided to pay £100,000 (thats about $190,000) to clone him.

Edgar and Nina Otto decided to have DNA samples of their pooch Sir Lancelot frozen six years ago, after he was diagnosed with cancer.

After he died last January in 2008, the wealthy pair then paid a biotech firm £108,000 to create Lancelot Encore.

BioArts International created Lancelot Encore in South Korea, where he was born 10 weeks ago. The Ottos are thrilled and say he’s the first single-birth, commercially cloned puppy in the United States

Lancelot Encore was flown to Miami International Airport, where the Ottos were waiting to greet him.

‘I ended up down on the floor with him in the middle of the airport,’ laughed Nina, 66.

‘He looked just like my original Lancelot. The most interesting thing about this Lancelot we notice he’s bonded immediately within an hour with every other pets in the house. He’s the Alpha dog!’

‘We hope (he’s the same as the original),’ Ed, 79, added.

‘But we do realize if he’s different we’re not going to love him any less.’

The Ottos already have nine other dogs, 10 cats, six sheep and four parrots on their 12 acres in West Boca, but they insisted Lancelot was special.

‘He was a human dog,’ Ed said. ‘He read your emotions. He knew when to be with you and when to leave you alone.’

BioArts CEO Lou Hawthorne teamed with Dr Hwang Woo-suk, a scientist with South Korea’s Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, to produce the dog.

Hwang, a controversial figure, lost his research professorship at Seoul National University in 2004 after fraudulently claiming that he had cloned human embryos and stem cells.

He was, however, involved in creating an Afghan hound clone the next year.

To create Lancelot Encore, Woo-suk took an egg from what Hawthorne called ‘an indigenous Korean dog’ resembling a bloodhound, replaced the egg’s innards with the late Lancelot’s DNA, then implanted the egg in a second Korean dog.

Two months later, Lancelot Encore was born, weighing 1lb 3oz. He’s now grown to 17lbs, but is still small enough to be tucked into his yellow pet stroller.

The Ottos make no apologies for splashing out so much cash on their new pet, though they said their next dog would come from a shelter.

Full story at Daily Mail

Hotel For Dogs

One for the younger members.

Top Hollywood Dogs

We are back again. Due to other commitments, we’ve not posted new entries. So lets get this started again with a list of hollywood dogs. Theres been a lot of dog movies coming out recently (including our best bud, Marley) – so here is a list:

Marley & Me

Lady and the Tramp

The Wizard of Oz

Underdog

The Shaggy Dog

Lassie

Old Yeller

Beethoven

Air Bud

Lady and the Tramp

Turner & Hooch

Beverly Hills Chihuahua

Rin Tin Tin

Snow Dogs

My Dog Skip

As Good as it Gets

101 Dalmations

Benji

Clifford

Cats. vs. Dogs

Post your hollywood dogs in the comments.

Unhealthy British bulldog to get makeover

This article is from Pets: News & Videos about Pets - CNN.com The classic English bulldog, a symbol of defiance and pugnacity often likened to wartime leader Winston Churchill, is set to breathe a little easier under revised breed standards issued in Britain.

Marley And Me

So what did folks think of the movie?

Don’t forget, you can also become Marley’s pal over at MyDogSpace