Is Cloning the Future of Red Wolf Conservation? No.
Recent news of Colossal Biosciences Inc. cloning of wolves was hard to ignore this week. As the Senior Research Scientist at the Wolf Conservation Center, I have spent my professional life dedicated to the conservation of Red Wolves in the wild and know first-hand the challenges that their recovery faces. Although cloning has some potential to serve among existing conservation tools, there are more immediate and effective methods to promote long term survival and well-being of Red Wolves. Cloning is a solution in search of a problem that doesn’t exist for Red Wolves.
Currently, there are only 16 Red Wolves known to remain in the wild. Our immediate concern is for the survival of those Red Wolves. And believe me, they are imperiled. The leading threat to Red Wolf survival is human-caused mortality – vehicle collisions and shooting deaths. Cloning and other biotechnology cannot protect Red Wolves from cars or bullets, nor do they increase human empathy for Red Wolves.
In addition to the 16 Red Wolves in the wild, there are currently 270 Red Wolves in captivity that are waiting to be released to the wild. They represent the historical Red Wolf, which resulted from thousands of years of natural selection. They reproduce naturally in captivity and in the wild – we don’t need to clone them. It is limited captive space that prevents the population from increasing and improving genetic diversity. Resolving this requires a community to care for these animals, and the Wolf Conservation Center works to identify new partners to join the red wolf community.
The cloned “Red Wolves” are not Red Wolves. They were derived from coyotes captured in southwest Louisiana for the Gulf Coast Canid Project. I know these were coyotes because I served as field supervisor and captured 44 coyotes for the project during 2021–2022.
Several of the coyotes that I captured in 2022 may have served as donors for cloning. I also continue to conduct field research in the region independent of that group. I have yet to capture anything that approaches a Red Wolf from that area.
Regardless, we need to focus on our wild and captive Red Wolf populations. This is the work that we do, and that you support. We look forward to being part of the conversation and always putting science, ethics, and the welfare of wolves first.
Dr. Joseph Hinton, PhD
Senior Research Scientist
PS. Want to learn more about Red and dire wolves? Check out our webinar library. We hosted Dr. Angela Perri in 2021 for a discussion about dire wolf origins, and Dr. Joey Hinton has led multiple conversations about the history and ecology of Red Wolves.
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