this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2024
140 points (98.6% liked)

News

23664 readers
3884 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Fluke 55 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Fun!

Still trying to figure out exactly what was wrong about what he did. A linked article says:

"...the defendant violated the Lacey Act that restricts wildlife trafficking and prohibits the sale of falsely labeled wildlife."

I guess specifically bringing embryos/sperm of a banned animal into Montana, more than the cloning operation.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 40 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Sheep breeds that are not allowed in Montana were brought into the state as part of the conspiracy, including 43 sheep from Texas, prosecutors said.

Dude sold to "trophy hunters" and brought in animals that will outcompete and replace native species.

It's a pretty big deal ecologically, and was done for just about the worst reasons

And it wasn't even super unique sheep, it was a couple states away

Also unsure how much "cloning" went into pulling sperm off removed testicles...

In October 2019, court records said, Schubarth paid a hunting guide $400 for the testicles of a trophy-sized Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep that had been harvested in Montana and then extracted and sold the semen, court records said.

[–] KnitWit@lemmy.world 8 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yeah, I read this article and a similar one the other day and it sure sounds to me like he just cross bred some sheep and none of the people involved know what cloning is. He apparently cloned the sheep, but then used it to breed hybrids? That he sold based on percent of the originals DNA? If you can clone in the first place (doubtful, obviously), why are you then breeding anything?

One small rant I’d like to make as this article glosses over his bullshit of a sentence. This country is absolutely fucking terrible about enforcing poaching, wildlife trafficking, or any other number of clear degradations to our natural environment. Ignoring the fact that he most likely didn’t even hybridize anything, because ‘paid off a hunter for the ram’s testicle’ doesn’t inspire confidence as to the care of the sperm cells; he still was illegally trafficking wild animals and their body parts with the intent of raising invasive animals for distribution. And yet, he not only isn’t even getting a slap on the wrist, the judge in the case is fawning over him like he outsmarted all those fancy college kids by cloning a sheep in his barn with nothing more than his own wits and god on his side.

[–] stoly@lemmy.world 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I was reading and rereading that bad article to figure out what the problem was. Thanks for that.

[–] thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

it bears a striking resemblance to the story behind Africanized honey bees.

the risk is the same as any other international transport and release of a non native species; invasive species that damage the ecosystem. that these are creatures that don't exist anywhere and don't have a native habitat just makes them that much harder to predict. this was all clearly done without any thoughts about the repercussions or how to avoid them.

[–] tal@lemmy.today 5 points 2 months ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lacey_Act_of_1900

The Lacey Act of 1900 is a conservation law in the United States that prohibits trade in wildlife, fish, and plants that have been illegally taken, possessed, transported, or sold.[1]

Yeah, the description there makes it sound like the issue is just that the source of the tissue wasn't legal. The quote from the judge makes it sounds like the objection was that he was doing cloning and breeding at all.