Second chances? Bizarre tale of how a Texas couple cloned their beloved gentle bull named Chance - only to get an aggressive animal who gored its owner TWICE
- Ralph and Sandra Fisher had a beloved and gentle Brahman Bull named Chance who was the star of their animal show business based out of their Texas home
- Chance died in 1999, but the Fishers convinced the veterinary labs at Texas A&M University to clone him as part of their ongoing research into the process
- They named the new bull Second Chance, and the Fishers thought they'd had their beloved pet reborn, even after he savagely gored them twice
A Texas couple made history in 1999 when they had their beloved pet - a massive but gentle Brahman bull named Chance - cloned in the hopes of keeping some part of him alive.
Ralph and Sandra Fisher operated an animal show business from their Texas home, and Chance was their star. An unusually tame creature, Chance would be brought around to events where customers were welcomed to climb onto his broad back and pose for photographs.
The Fishers travelled wide with Chance - they took him on the Late Show where David Letterman rode him on stage, he appeared in a Vince Vaughn movie, and he even partook in a Superbowl halftime show.
But Chance was more than just a moneymaker for the Fishers - his gentle demeanor made him a part of their family. The bull freely roamed the pastures at their Texas home, and even had a favorite spot under a tree outside the kitchen window where they could watch him while they cooked or did dishes after dinner. So in the late 1990s as Chance was nearing 20 years old - very old for a bull - the Fishers couldn't help but be drawn to the headlines about cloning that were coming out of universities across the country.
One such institution was the nearby Texas A&M University, where the Fishers phoned and requested researchers to undertake a cloning experiment on Chance. Three months before the bull died at 19 years old, the university consented, and months later a calf was born from DNA extracted from Chance. The fishers named the young bull Second Chance.
Though experts insisted Second Chance was not Chance reborn and was more akin to a twin, Ralph was convinced there was a closer connection. Though the bulls never met, Second Chance would lay in the same spot in the yard Chance used to, and they had a number of distinctly similar mannerisms. Even after the new bull became suddenly aggressive years later - dangerously goring Ralph twice - the Fishers remained convinced they truly had a second Chance on his hands.
Chance, the Brahman bull that was the star of Ralph and Sandra Fisher's animal show
Second Chance shortly after his birth. He was cloned from the bull Chance in 1999
Ralph and Sandra Fisher with Second Chance, who they believed was a sort of reincarnation of their beloved bull he was cloned from
Ralph spent his life working in rodeos, and when he came across Chance at an auction he knew he'd found a one-of-a-kind creature.
'He's just like a big bundle of just loving whatever. If you've ever had a favorite dog that you can think of as a child, or some other animal,' Ralph told This American Life. 'He'd lick your face, you know? And yes, he was cuddly.'
Sandra agreed with her husband about Chance's uncommon qualities, telling how emotive he was, how he would try to cuddle with them, and saying having him around was like 'having a pet dog or a pet cat, except the size.'
The Fishers made their money bringing farm animals around to events where people would pose with them, and Chance's demeanor made him their biggest crowd pleaser.
Along the way Chance posed with countless celebrities, including Roger Clemens, Ashley Judd, Sugar Ray Leonard, Sonny Bono, and even Mother Theresa. In Vince Vaughn's 1997 movie The Locusts, Chance appeared as the only creature a reclusive character played by Jeremy Davies would converse with.
Brahman Bulls rarely live much longer than 20 years, and in 1999 Chance was well into his old age. Knowing their days together were numbered, Frank listened to a friend and phoned Texas A&M, where he'd heard the school's world-famous veterinary school was undertaking cloning experiments.
'And so we called up and said, you know, you're going to clone an animal, right?,' Ralph told This American Life. 'They said, yes, we take tissue and we - and we said, well, why don't you use Chance?'
The scientists at the lab were resistant at first, so Ralph enlisted friends to call in and suggest they clone Chance.
'And so other folks would call, then. Some friends would call and talk to him. And they finally just - I think we bothered them so much, they gave up. They said, OK, well, we'll do it,' he said.
In addition to the urgings of Chance's fanbase, Texas A&M finally relented when they decided they would like to try cloning an animal as old as Chance was. While Chance was at the hospital getting a mole checked out by doctors, they extracted some DNA from the growth and used it to begin cloning him.
Chance appeared in countless photoshoots during his career with the Fishers animal show
Chance appeared on the Letterman Show, where David Letterman rode his back
Chance (left, looking away) alongside a Texas longhorn with guests posing atop them
Three months later, Ralph found Chance lying dead in the yard.
Ralph and his wife had a long cry over Chance's death, as did their kids, the rest of their family, and a number of people who had known him over the years.
But all the while, the lab A&M was hard at work cloning Chance, and 10 months after his death a baby calf was born from the cells they'd taken from him.
'He was just the prettiest little white Brahman calf you ever saw. And spindly. And barely able to stand,' Ralph said.
Ralph named the new bull the only thing that made sense to him - Second Chance.
The Fishers said from the moment Second Chance came home, they felt like he knew them.
'I just feel like he always recognized Ralph,' Sandra said. 'Ralph would lay down on the ground, and Second Chance would lick him and lick his boots. And Second Chance would lope across the pasture and come to us. And we watched other people. Vets would crawl in there, and he wouldn't come across the pasture to them. He just always seemed to recognize Ralph.'
When they first turned Second Chance loose in their pasture at home, the Fishers said he walked right over the Chance's favorite spot under the tree and laid down.
'The first day we brought him home, we turned him loose over here in the yard. And he went over and laid down in the same spot,' Rsalph said. 'This still kind of chokes me up. He laid down in the same spot that Chance laid in, you know? That's not reasonable.'
Ralph Fisher with Chance shortly after his death.
Dr. Jonathan Hill (left) and Dr. Mark Westhusin (right) of Texas A&M University with Second Chance, shortly after the cloned bull's birth
Second Chance (front) shortly after he was successfully cloned and birthed at Texas A&M
Texas A&M scientist Dr. Mark Westhusin worked with the Fishers on Chance's cloning, and insisted that Second Chance was in no way any kind of a reincarnation of the original bull, that he was more like a twin.
'People get attached to their animals,' he told This American Life. 'And they want to, sometimes, see more than is there. And they do see more than is, maybe, really there.'
'That's love. That's not necessarily a bad thing. And it was interesting for me to listen to Ralph tell how he lies under the same tree, and he eats his food just the same as the old Chance did.'
But as the years passed Ralph became convinced that Second Chance was in some way a rebirth of Chance himself. He believed the animals had the same mannerisms, that they ate in the same unique way, that they looked the same, and that the older he got the more Second Chance mirrored his forebearer's gentle personality.
'Dr. Westhusin reminded me several times, this is not the same animal. Don't expect the same attitude from a pet,' Ralph told This American Life. 'And I didn't believe him, because everything looked the same. Just when I see him, especially at a distance, he looks so much like Chance. And every day, as he gets older and older, so much.'
Then on Second Chance's second birthday - after a barbeque celebration, complete with birthday cake - Ralph was leading the bull back to his stall when suddenly he felt a massive horn ram into his back. Within moments Ralph's shoulder was dislocated and he was thrown to the ground while the giant bull bore down on him.
'He picked me up and slammed me down.' Ralph said. 'Then he proceeded to get on top of me with mostly his head, his forehead, and his horns.'
'We found three deep, deep holes, six or eight inches, in the yard that next day where he had missed me. And he was really trying - he was really attacking. It was like, you know, on purpose.'
'Oh, no. I said, oh no, this can't be. This can't be happening. Because we had had so much faith in him... I remember, when I was kicking him in the face, I was just going, how could you be doing this to me? Quit it. I think my feelings - he actually hurt my pride.'
Despite the attack, Ralph still held out hope that Second Chance would grow into the gentle bull Chance was.
'The hope is involving his age, since I did not have chance until he was almost seven years old,' Ralph said.
Even if Second Chance never mellowed into what Chance had been, Ralph said he was still happy with what parts of Chance he had.
'So far, right now, I feel like we've gotten about 95 percent of him back - I mean, the same qualities, the same fun. That satisfies me. That's better than zero.'
Second Chance at home at the Fisher's ranch in Texas. He liked lying in the same spot his forebearer Chance used to rest in
Ralph Fisher and Second Chance. He said he thought the new bull was 95 percent the same as his beloved Chance
Sandra Fisher with Second Chance at their home in Texas. After the bull died, she reflected that she felt like they'd lost their beloved Chance twice
About a year and a half after that first attack, Ralph was feeding Second Chance in his pen when the bull attack him again.
This time the bull tossed Ralph into the air where he landed on a fence, then toppled to the ground as Second Chance rammed him against the fence and into the ground again and again.
Ralph was rushed to the hospital with multiple injuries, including a hairline fracture to his spine and a torn scrotum.
A day after the attack Ralph remained in high spirits, and still maintained his affection for Second Chance.
'We just have to have a lot of faith in things to work out,' Ralph told This American Life. 'So I forgive him, you know? I just shouldn't have been that close.'
Ralph maintained that after Second Chance turned seven years old he would know how much of Chance he really had gotten back through the cloning.
Second Chance would never attack anybody again, and he did become gentler as he aged, but the Fishers said they could never let their guard down with him in quite the way they did with Chance.
The bull finally died in March 2008, but not before Texas A&M collected some tissue from him, which made a Third Chance possible.
After Second Chance died, Sandra sent an email around to friends informing them of the news.
'To think that this huge animal who's put Ralph in the hospital twice will be so missed - it never occurred to us that by having a clone we would lose him twice,' she wrote.
No comments:
Post a Comment