A Montana rancher was charged with illegally selling offspring from a cloned sheep across state lines.
There's nothing illegal about selling sheep for exorbitant prices — unless those animals are Marco Polo argali sheep, or in Schubarth's case, hybrids of Marco Polo argali sheep.
Marco Polo argali sheep are native to central Asia and are considered threatened under the US Endangered Species Act.
Shortly thereafter, Schubarth allegedly got his hands on some of those sheep parts and, in 2015, paid a deposit of $4,200 to produce cloned sheep embryos from the dead argali's remains.
AdvertisementIn May 2017, a pure argali sheep was born from one of those cloned embryos.
Persons:
—, Arthur, Jack, Schubarth, Marco Polo, George Schaller, Joyce Tischler, Lacey, King, Matthew Polak, Dolly, it's, Alison Van Eenennaam, Davis, Van Eenennaam, Gregory Kaebnick, isn't, Rula Rouhana, Reuters It's, Kaebnick, didn't
Organizations:
Service, Department, Lewis & Clark Law School's Center for Animal Law, European Union, Getty, University of California, and Wildlife Service, The Hastings Center, Reproductive Biotechnology, Reuters
Locations:
Montana, Asia, Kyrgyzstan, Dubai