Former Scripps Fellows help expose the truth behind Lynxgate

By Josh Blumenfeld

Former Ted Scripps Fellows Dan Glick and Paul Tolme helped expose the truth behind one of the biggest environmental stories of 2002: Lynxgate.

You don't remember Lynxgate? Here's a quick summary.

According to The Washington Times, which broke the story just before Christmas 2001, wildlife biologists in Washington state allegedly planted clumps of Canadian lynx fur in the Gifford Pinchot and Wenatchee national forests to make it appear that this threatened species resided in these areas. The intent of the scientists, said the Times, was the closure of these forests to logging and recreation under the Endangered Species Act.

The problem was, the story just wasn't true.

"The great irony was that many journalists cited Lynxgate as scientists manipulating data, when it was really journalists manipulating facts for their stories," Tolme said.

In an article published in the May/June 2002 edition of Extra, the magazine of Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting, Tolme showed how this inaccurate story was used by right-wing media as a tool to attack environmentalists and the Endangered Species Act. Tolme followed the story as it jumped from the Times to more mainstream media, including the Associated Press, the Rocky Mountain News and the Wall Street Journal.

After reading the first round of stories, Tolme began investigating the story as a freelancer for Newsweek.

"I saw that the players involved had an anti-endangered species agenda," Tolme said. "This raised my radar."

While Tolme was investigating the story, Outside magazine had contacted Dan Glick about writing a Lynxgate story. According to Glick, Outside believed the Times story and wanted Glick to find out why the scientists had faked the data.

"I looked at the people going after the environmentalists and I knew it was all the usual characters," Glick said.

Glick's article, "Debunking Lynxgate," appeared in the April 2002 issue of Outside.

The work by Tolme, Glick, Ted Williams in Audubon magazine, Lynda Mapes of the Seattle Times and others, revealed the truth about Lynxgate.

The lab used to verify lynx hair had made mistakes in the past, said scientists involved in the lynx study. To check the accuracy of the lab, the scientists submitted several control samples in 1999 and 2000, including hair from captive lynx and hairs plucked from a stuffed bobcat named "Harry." Unfortunately, the national lynx study doesn't authorize using control samples, and the scientists were disciplined and removed from the study.

The story would have ended there had someone not tipped off The Washington Times in mid-December 2001 about the incident. The Times interpretation was one of activist environmentalists using the Endangered Species Act as a tool to prevent access to Washington state forests. From there, the story gathered momentum as industry groups and conservative lawmakers used the story to attack endangered species policies and environmentalists.

As Glick wrote in his Outside article, ". . . the bigger picture here should give pause to anyone concerned over how easily politics trumps science inside the Beltway."

Thanks to the work by former Scripps Fellows Glick and Tolme, along with their colleagues who also were willing to dig for the truth, Lynxgate has faded into obscurity. However, the next Lynxgate may be right around the corner.

"You're always appalled at how the bad reporting sticks," Tolme said.

Josh Blumenfeld is a Master's student in environmental journalism at the University of Colorado at Boulder.