Chinese firm creates first Cloned Kitten

Seven months after Huang Yu’s pet cat Garlic died, the British short hair was given a 10th life.

Born on July 21, the new Garlic was created by Chinese firm Sinogene, becoming the Beijing-based company’s first successfully copied cat.

The pet-cloning outfit has made more than 40 pet dogs — a procedure that costs a hefty 380,000 yuan ($53,000), while the price for a cat comes in at 250,000 yuan ($35,000).

Mi Jidong, the company’s chief executive officer, told  AFP  that despite the high price tag, not all clients were high earners.

Huang, 23,owner of  new Garlic. was overjoyed on first seeing Garlic’s second incarnation, saying the “similarity between the two cats is more than 90 per cent”.

“When Garlic died, I was very sad,” said Huang. “I couldn’t face the facts because it was a sudden death. I blame myself for not taking him to the hospital in time, which led to his death.”

The happy owner says he hopes the personality of the new Garlic is as similar to his old white-and-grey cat as its appearance.

The first major success in animal cloning was Dolly the sheep, born in Britain in 1996 as the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.