Dire wolf

[Maxed Out]

 Scientists brought this species of wolf back from extinction. They went extinct 13,000 years ago.

 Hearing this news, I have a request to bring back the sabre tooth salmon, which went extinct many thousands of years ago.

 The sabre tooth salmon was native to California, and would reach length of over 9' and weight of 400+ pounds !! Just imagine a cow salmon !!

[Donnyboat]

Thanks Ted, yes it is amaising what there doing with DNA, these days, cheers Don.

[oldmanjoe]

     Will It eat people ?    

[Keta]

Turn them loose in SF.

[Brewcrafter]

No time to get too excited; I am not sure the that they bought an extinct species back from the dead; what they did was some amazing science and resurrected the DNA of an extinct species.  Much like the guys who made a fuzzy mouse (no, its not going to become a Woolly Mammoth).  Once a month we go to UCR Science Night at a local coffee house, and sometimes they are pretty good (meaning I can understand some of what these kids are saying).  One of my favorites (keep in mind UCR is a Citrus science place) that pretty much all citrus as we know it has decended from 5 or 7 parent varieties (in his words, "this is the stuff that highly funded pHd guys argues over).  Amazing.  Stuff like "chromosome hopping". - john

[oc1]

The problem with all the Colossal Biosciences stuff is that, after all these centuries, there is no clear definition of what constitutes a species.  The world of taxonomy is full of "lumpers" and splitters" who have been arguing about such stuff since Linneaus.  For a while they thought that DNA analysis would put it all to rest.  But, no.  Every DNA sample is different, and it becomes a matter of degrees.

[JasonGotaProblem]

Most our taxonomy pre-DNA comes from getting different animals to get it on, and seeing if it results in pregnancy, and if so, is the offspring sterile.

A lot of this stuff is great for headlines. But will there actually be a proper dire wolf? We'll see.

[Brewcrafter]

and if so, is the offspring sterile.

Yes, one of the things I learned is that citrus (and other fruit trees) are like that.  I had a thought to send another one of our Ohana some seeds from my lemon tree, but what I learned was that there would be a limited number of outcomes: he might get a tree to grow that never bears fruit, or he may get a tree to grow that bears an entirely different variety since most citrus is from grafting.  We have the parent Washington Naval Orange tree still growing here in Riverside. - john

[Swami805]

I used to go to UCR for conferences to get continuing education hours to keep certifications. Their collections of citrus is crazy, it's maintaining all those trees so the genetics aren't lost. They do very important work there, the first line of defense against imported plant pathogens and insects

[redsetta]

I believe the 'wooly mouse' and the 'dire wolf' were both from Colossal?
I think you're right re: it being a modest genetic adaptation to what is - for all intents and purposes - still a gray wolf, but it seems to have been a terrific attention-getter.
It's a pity really, because they recently bred a litter of US red wolves which have sufficient genetic diversity (through Colossal's techniques) to genuinely add to the gene pool of the 20 or so remaining individuals.
It's a legitimate step towards saving the red wolf from extinction, but clearly not as sensational as a 'dire wolf'...
'Tis all fascinating stuff really.
Hope yer all keeping well.
Cheers, Justin

[Donnyboat]

In the Harvey area of Western Australia, most of the citrus is grafted onto a tryfoliater route stock, me not quite sure of my spelling of tryfoliater route stock, cheers Don.

[Brewcrafter]

In the Harvey area of Western Australia, most of the citrus is grafted onto a tryfoliater route stock, me not quite sure of my spelling of tryfoliater route stock, cheers Don.

Don - One thing I learned is that the origin of pretty much all citrus is China/SE Asia, so it makes sense there would be plenty of citrus varieties in Australia. - john

[oc1]

In the Harvey area of Western Australia, most of the citrus is grafted onto a tryfoliater route stock, me not quite sure of my spelling of tryfoliater route stock, cheers Don.

My grandmother had an orange tree that was killed back in an unusual cold snap and regrew from the root stock instead of the graft.  They were terrible sour oranges but she kept the tree for the shade.

[Joel.B]

At 9' long and 400 pounds, these salmon used to migrate up coastal rivers and streams every year to eat bears

[natch!]

 Well, if they eat bears, Lee might be right. They might do well in SF. As to the citrus, according to the John McPhee book "Oranges" most commercial oranges are grafted onto either sour orange or rough lemon stock.

 Jack