132 SIDELINES JANUARY 2014
FOR HORSE PEOPLE • ABOUT HORSE PEOPLE
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By Lauren R. Giannini
Mark Watring’s Holsteiner jumper gelding has a son! That’s
right: a foal sired by a gelding – one of the most amazing modern
miracles, made possible only by cloning technology. Bella, a
Dutch mare chosen for her outstanding bloodlines, gave birth to
a gorgeous colt, sired by Saphir, the clone and exact genetic twin
of the gelding Sapphire. Saphir, born with the entire procreative
package, contributed the actual sperm: every molecule of that
DNA owes its existence to the jumper gelding Sapphire. That’s
why, technically speaking, one can say with all accuracy that
Sapphire, the imported Holsteiner gelding, has sired his first son.
There is nothing like a birth announcement in the horse world,
and this one generates great excitement. Cloning technology
allows the perpetuation of bloodlines of an outstanding equine
like Sapphire, Mark’s inimitable partner with whom he won the
individual show jumping gold medal at the 2003 Pan American
Games. The gray Holsteiner, imported as a gelding, offered all the
right reasons to clone him: athleticism, temperament, pedigree,
performance and heart.
The first foal, serendipitously a colt, was born on June 13, 2013
at Replica Farm in New Jersey. To clone is the first step into the
reproductive possibilities. When the clone stands at stud, that’s
the next big horizon in cloning technology. “The colt is so nice – we
named him Spectacular – and I just hope he ends up being fancy-
fancy,” Mark said. Only time will tell if Sapphire’s first offspring,
now a weanling, will be a chip off the original block, but already
Mark has fulfilled a dream: his great equine partner Sapphire has
a son.
The Gelding Sapphire’s Story
After his success in the Pan Ams, wherein he took advantage
of dual citizenship to ride for Puerto Rico and essentially
relegated the USA’s Chris Kappler and Margie Goldstein-Engle
to silver and bronze respectively, Mark continued to compete
Sapphire. “I had people wanting to buy Sapphire the mare – I
told them that’s McLain’s jumper. Then I had people wanting
to buy Sapphire the stallion,” he recalled. “I’d tell them, ‘no,
it’s a gelding.’ They’d say, ‘you’re kidding, I had someone lined
up to buy him as a breeding stallion.’ All that time in my mind
I was thinking, ‘oh, if only you were a stallion!’ Then I started
investigating.”
A search of the internet to see if they were cloning horses led
him to Kathleen McNulty of Replica Farm, representative for
ViaGen. One of the foremost U.S. authorities on cloning, she
has a long history of foaling mares as well as training as a vet
tech. Mark took the first vital step: banking Sapphire’s genes
by taking a biopsy and storing his genetic material. “I got so
excited about that and thought, ‘gosh, I’m already in my late
40s, am I really going to wait to clone this horse?’” Mark said.
“So I called and said ‘I’m ready to do it.’”
According to Kathleen, the project has come full circle with
the birth of Sapphire’s first foal. “We knew it was going to be
a good breeding project because Sapphire has such good
bloodlines,” she said. “It’s also a long term project – Saphir
is only three and we have only the one test foal, but this year
Saphir will be available for commercial breeding. There are a
lot of clones on the ground, and people are starting to see the
Sapphire’s first foal, Spectacular, and his dam, Bella Dancer,
German Sporthorse by Kathleen McNulty’s stallion, Raine
Dance (by Concorde, by Voltaire), owned by Chandelle and Gia
Spargo (Millstone, New Jersey): “They were wonderful to loan
Bella to me for this project,” Kathleen said. “The mare has great
bloodlines. If there was anything at all to add to our foal, beside
Sapphire’s attributes, it would be size. He’s 16.2 and Bella is
17.2, so we expect Spectacular to be somewhere in the middle.”
Photos courtesy of Kathleen McNulty/Replica Farm, unless noted otherwise.
Continued on page 134
Sapphire’s First Foal – It’s A Colt!
