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Lynx-fur furor focuses on science role
Seattle Times ^ | 12/30/2001 | Lynda V. Mapes

Posted on 12/31/2001 9:30:22 PM PST by jennyp

Government field biologists have unwittingly detonated the explosive tension between science and politics in land-management decisions throughout the West.

At immediate stake is the credibility of surveys to determine how widespread the threatened Canada lynx is. But the controversy also is being used by some to claim science is being manipulated to support unpopular political decisions.

Lynx chronology


1998: The U.S. Forest Service launches a survey for lynx that is later discredited because the results were ruined in the lab.

1999: The U.S. Forest Service launches another lynx survey, with a new lab and a new protocol.

1999: A state biologist sends hairs from a captive bobcat to a lab as part of the survey, saying he wants to test the accuracy of the lab. So-called positive control samples, while not unusual in science, were outside the bounds of the survey and unauthorized.

2000: State and federal biologists send in hairs from captive lynx, saying they want to test the accuracy of the lab. In September, one of the biologists notifies the lab of the samples.

February 2001: The Forest Service launches an investigation, which determines the biologists acted without authorization, but were trying to confirm the accuracy of the lab, not skew the survey. The biologists are counseled, but not disciplined.

December 2001: news of the investigation breaks, and further inquiries are called for.

Source: Seattle Times

The firestorm came after some field biologists in the U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife sent unauthorized hair samples from captive lynx — and from a bobcat pelt — to a federal lab in 1999 and 2000.

The survey is being used by federal scientists to detect the presence of the threatened Canada lynx. It will play a part in determining whether logging and wintertime motorized recreation should be restricted to protect the animals.

The biologists said they were testing the laboratory's capabilities. Sending in control samples is a common practice in lab testing. But the biologists, all working in Washington state, were acting outside the rules of this particular survey. And their actions were reported inaccurately in stories widely re-circulated by the media this month.

The Washington Times, for example, reported biologists planted lynx hair on posts at lynx survey stations in the Gifford Pinchot and Wenatchee National Forests. The paper said that if a whistle-blower hadn't acted, the fake samples would have shut down public lands to protect lynx that weren't actually there.

Investigators say biologists mailed to a lab, in vials, unauthorized control samples from captive cats. Several told their supervisors about it, and one notified the lab itself.

Even if undetected, the samples would not have shut down the woods. The federal survey is just one piece of a much more complicated land-use policy calculus.

Investigators so far have found the biologists weren't trying to skew the study, but only wanted to test the accuracy of the survey lab because of questionable results in the past. The unauthorized samples sent to the lab were segregated from valid field samples, so the survey was not skewed, according to the Forest Service.

But Barbara Weber, associate deputy chief for research and development at the U.S. Forest Service in Washington, D.C., saw real damage from what was done.

"It affects the reputation of us as an agency overall because we say we are a science-based organization," Weber said. "If people are tainting data and planting data, that speaks to the integrity and credibility of the agency as a whole and any policy we make with that data. It is huge, beyond what they thought could be an outcome of this."

Earlier survey planted doubts

The Canada lynx was listed in March, under the federal Endangered Species Act, as threatened in 16 northern states. Officials from Washington state to Maine are trying to determine the range of the animal and efforts are under way to improve lynx survival in 57 national forests.

Lynx are rare, inconspicuous and primarily nocturnal. They leave little sign, and avoid human activity. Unlike salmon, grizzly bears and other federally-protected species, relatively little is known about lynx in the contiguous United States. Even the basics, such as reliable population estimates, don't yet exist.

The U.S. Forest Service launched one lynx survey in 1998, which was discredited because the results were ruined at the lab.

After the current survey was launched in 1999, with a new lab and a new protocol, some biologists said they sent in hairs from captive cats to find out if the new lab in Missoula, Mont., could correctly identify them.

Jeff "Bernie" Bernatowicz, a Washington state fish and wildlife field biologist, said in an interview he told his supervisor that he sent in hairs from a captive lynx.

"I didn't trust the results of the lab, so I wasn't going to tell them I was sending in a blind sample. A 1998 study came out with the results of lynx up and down the Cascades, and that didn't seem logical. Most of us doubted it. How could there be so many lynx?"

Weber said she knew the faulty 1998 survey had shaken the confidence of field biologists.

"People in the Forest Service I think are confused as to who to believe and what to believe, and if I were them I would be confused too," Weber said. "I think it played a large role in terms of people taking things into their own hands."

But their doubts were no excuse, Weber said.

"If they had concerns, they could have raised those concerns with the supervisors and asked, 'How does this study work, and how can we know that the lab is accurately recognizing samples?' "

In a signed affidavit collected by federal investigators, Bernatowicz stated his supervisor knew he sent in the sample — collected from a lynx that had escaped from a Union Gap fur farm and was being held in a cage until its owner could get it.

The supervisor expressed "some concern," but then allowed him to send in the sample, Bernatowicz stated.

Federal field biologists working in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Southwest Washington also sent in unauthorized control samples, snagged off a wire fence around captive lynx at a wildlife park. A state fish and wildlife biologist also sent in a hunk of a bobcat pelt in his office.

When the results for the bobcat pelt came back as unidentifiable, the biologist, Tom McCall, didn't try to keep its origin a secret. He laughed and said, "Those samples were taken from old Harry."

His supervisor — whose name was blacked out in the investigative report — said of the unauthorized control samples:

"I didn't think it was any big deal. This was due to the fact that I did not believe Mr. McCall was trying to tamper with the integrity of the survey by creating a false impression that lynx existed in the survey. In retrospect I can understand why submitting false information to the survey could color any other information sent in."

The first the lab learned of the unauthorized samples was in September 2000. A Forest Service biologist on his last day on the job before retirement phoned the lab to say biologists were concerned about how the survey was going, and were sending in fur from captive lynx as a control sample.

Workers at the lab called the Forest Service, which launched an investigation last February that was completed in June, and determined that the survey was not skewed. The biologists were counseled, but not disciplined.

Credibility undermined

The incident wounded the scientific credibility of state and federal agencies that turn to science to defend politically unpopular decisions, from turning off irrigation ditches for salmon to silencing chain saws for spotted owls.

For some, the incident fueled long-held suspicions.

"There are always questions about the validity of science in any of these studies, that it is biased one way or another," said Nicholas Haris, western-states representative of the American Motorcyclist Association, which advocates for off-road vehicle access to public lands. "Everybody seems to back their decisions with science, but a lot of people feel a lot of these things are predetermined before it starts."

The scandal metastasized in just one week this month after results of the Forest Service investigation were leaked to the media after congressional briefings.

Members of Congress and secretaries of two federal agencies have called for investigations by inspectors general as well as the General Accounting Office. Washington state lawmakers also have called for a hearing.

Daniel Kemmis, director of the Center for the Rocky Mountain West, a politically moderate think tank based in Missoula, said the reaction should come as no surprise, given the extent to which agencies and user groups have resorted to the mantra of "good science" to do the heavy political lifting in natural-resource disputes.

"I've become more and more perturbed by the way that people on both sides of the political fence are always calling on science as the final arbiter on natural-resource decisions," Kemmis said. "To me it's either cynical or naïve."

Appeals to science are often an effort to short-circuit or skip the hard, political work of building collaboration, Kemmis said.

Even biologists can't forget they work in a political context, said Jeffrey Koenings, director of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Koenings blamed the scandal on arrogance among biologists who either didn't appreciate how their actions might be interpreted by others, or didn't care. "We make hard decisions that affect people's lives and if you are going to affect someone's life you have to make sure it is predicated on hard scientific evidence and that you have the resource in mind, and not someone's personal agenda. That's what so damaging about this, it calls all that into question," he said.

Koenings has apologized for the incident, which he said was isolated.

The scandal will undermine support for species-recovery efforts unless investigations restore the agencies' scientific credibility, said Rep. Jim Buck, R-Joyce, Clallam County, chairman of the House Republican Caucus.

Credible science is the only effective ammunition in conservation battles, Buck said. It is the only way to accurately scope the nature and extent of environmental problems, discern an appropriate response, and sell it politically to an often wary public, Buck said.

"It's the only thing you have to hang your hat on."


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The biologists said they were testing the laboratory's capabilities. Sending in control samples is a common practice in lab testing. But the biologists, all working in Washington state, were acting outside the rules of this particular survey. And their actions were reported inaccurately in stories widely re-circulated by the media this month.

The Washington Times, for example, reported biologists planted lynx hair on posts at lynx survey stations in the Gifford Pinchot and Wenatchee National Forests. [thread here] The paper said that if a whistle-blower hadn't acted, the fake samples would have shut down public lands to protect lynx that weren't actually there.

Investigators say biologists mailed to a lab, in vials, unauthorized control samples from captive cats. Several told their supervisors about it, and one notified the lab itself.

So, is this a story of corruption by gov't scientists, or a case study of how bad reporting can create a scandal out of nothing?

I don't know yet, but the initial stories claimed the scientists had placed lynx hair on the scratching posts out in the wild. This would've clearly been an attempt at fraud. But now it looks like they simply put control samples into some of the sample containers they sent to the lab.

In fact, it sounds like the field biologists did this because they were skeptical of the labs in light of the discredited 1998 study that had claimed there were lynx as far south as Oregon. Unfortunately, all I've seen on every lynx thread here on FR is cynical riffing by the uninformed on the original claims of fraud. Doesn't anybody here have any hard facts about the biologists in question? Does anybody here know if sending a control sample to a lab is good procedure in a case like this? It sounds like it would be to me. (Apparently their only sin was to do this on their own, in violation of the protocol for the study. Discipline them for that, OK. But where's the fraud?)

Then somehow the story gets to the press & gets mutated from "skeptical scientists overstep bounds" to "SCIENTIST FRAUD!!!" Incredible sloppiness by Audrey Hudson (Wash. Times reporter) if this article's characterization of the incident is true.

I guess there's going to be Congressional hearings on this case. (Sheesh!) Well, at least the truth will come out, presumably.

1 posted on 12/31/2001 9:30:22 PM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp, Carry_Okie, redrock, kattracks, kitchen, lowbridge, backhoe, blackie, GrampaDave, SierraW
More than that, Jenny Dahling.

More like control of land by corrupt bureaucrats.

Following is a part of a FReepmail i just received that discusses the situation. one of the addressees on this post sent it. He has my profound gratitude. Read and learn, Jenny.

Mark, do you want to weigh in here?

Saw the thread, but I'll review for updates. It is a local issue because of the plan to turn the Routt NF into a lynx study area.

Several years ago, the FS and the CO Division of Wildlife studied the forests and determined that there was no chance of success here. The last lynx was trapped before WW I, and there haven't been any snowshoe rabbits for about as long. I saw a snowshoe rabbit in the White River NF about 20 years ago and almost fainted. Anyway, it seemed that the lynx issue was settled until last year. I lost my contact info, but the gist was that, at a public meeting, the FS announced that they were going to make the Routt a lynx study area. When the audience pointed out that there was nothing for them to eat, the FS replied, "Ya, so what?" It isn't really about lynx; it's about banning motorized vehicles, chainsaws, hunting, etc. I hope for a connection between the criminal/feds in WA and the local decisions, as a way to get them set aside.

Guess who hobnobs with the FS types and conducts rulemaking meetings behind closed doors and then offers them to the "public" via a consensus building technique (a la the "Delphi Technique")?

Do your homework lady. The "Scientific Method" (tm) hasn't a chance against envirofascism.

2 posted on 12/31/2001 9:46:40 PM PST by sauropod
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To: jennyp
This article from the Seattle P-I (Dec 18) doesn't specify scratching post vs. sample vial...
Scientists' 'wild hair' really wasn't

Fur from tame lynx was inserted in samples to test laboratory's ability

Tuesday, December 18, 2001

By LISA STIFFLER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Snowmobilers and timber groups are wondering if government biologists have cried "lynx."

State and federal biologists recently admitted to planting fur samples in a survey to determine the distribution of Canadian lynx in national forests. Three samples taken from captive cats were added to samples reportedly found in the Wenatchee and Gifford Pinchot national forests.

But the biologists, who notified interested parties of what they did, said the samples were added to make sure the lab analyzing the fur was able to successfully detect lynx with its DNA analysis.

"It's a way of testing if a lab knows what it's doing," Doug Zimmer, spokesman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Lacey, said yesterday. "It was not an attempt to put lynx where they're not."

Lynx were found in the Okanogan National Forest in the survey, but not the two forests to which the samples were added. The false samples were removed from the study and did not taint its outcome. Samples were collected again this year.

If lynx -- which have protection as a federally threatened species -- had been found in Wenatchee and Gifford Pinchot national forests some activities, including snowmobiling and tree cutting, could be curtailed.

The elusive cat, with its broad, furry paws, is well-adapted to hunting snowshoe hares through snowy drifts. The snowmobiles pack the drifts and give unfair advantage to other predators competing with lynx for prey. Thickets of lodgepole pine need to be maintained as habitat for the hares.

Even if the lynx were shown to reside elsewhere in Washington, changes in land use would come slowly and would not necessarily be severe.

"Nothing would change overnight," said Rex Holloway, spokesman with the U.S. Forest Service.

Chris West, vice president of the timber group the American Forest Resource Council, said he wasn't sure the government biologists were trying to falsify results, but was concerned about the study.

"There's already been some funny business going on with the lynx," he said.

A few years ago, an Oregon lynx study performed by a contractor hired by the Forest Service was called into question, West said. The contractor claimed to find lynx, but the results could not be validated and the contractor was not paid.

The seven biologists who were part of the government study included employees of the Forest Service, Fish and Wildlife Service and state Department of Fish and Wildlife. An investigation was conducted into the adding of the samples as soon as it was discovered, and the scientists involved were taken off the project, agency spokesmen said.

"This is a very, very isolated incident," Zimmer said.

The samples falsely added to the survey came from two lynx, one belonging to a federal scientist doing research and the other from a wild-animal park, he said. "If you were really going to skew something, you would use samples that you picked off the wild."

In experiments, "control" samples can be added to test techniques, but their addition was not included in the protocol for this particular survey.

The incident could undermine the integrity of the research.

"It jeopardizes the whole process of trying to protect the lynx in the first place," said Glenn Warren, president of the Washington State Snowmobile Association, a group of about 2,300 registered members and their families.

"We always like to see good science prevailing."

3 posted on 12/31/2001 9:54:55 PM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
This was all a big mistake. It was supposed to read "Linux are rare, inconspicuous and primarily nocturnal."

I hope that clears things up.

4 posted on 12/31/2001 9:55:12 PM PST by PoorMuttly
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To: sauropod
If this description were true, this case should have been written up in advance as a single-blind test to validate the lab. Where is a dated document detailing the experimental design? Without that document, (and they surely would present it if they had it), this looks to me like a piece of crooked spin. As long as the supervisor agrees it was sent from a vial and not collected from the post we can't know the origin of the sample. Does the supervisor have a complicit motive?

How did they get the samples? Where are the requisitions? Fax records? Trip reports? Milage records? Where is the chain-of-custody document so common in such studies? Has anyone locked the files and sealed the computers?

It stinks of a coverup and may be a case of obstruction of justice.

5 posted on 12/31/2001 10:04:12 PM PST by Carry_Okie
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To: jennyp
This is spin. These people are criminals that have been caught in the act. Their purpose is to create "facts" or "science" that supports their agenda and to supress any information that would not support same. whether or not they actually were trying to "test" the lab, the fact that they didn't make it known to proper authorities indicates that they wanted to control the resultant information (by being the only ones privvy to it). Then they would release or supress according to their agenda. Thus fraud by premeditation, just like when you don't tell the local storekeep that there is no money in your checking account as you hand him the check.
6 posted on 12/31/2001 10:05:11 PM PST by Navy Patriot
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To: jennyp
Agencies need to restore credibility

Thursday, December 20, 2001

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

It hardly matters whether it was simply a well-meant attempt to test the accuracy of laboratory DNA analysis or a dishonest attempt to place the Canadian lynx into forests where it has not been found.

The damage is the same. The perception that something dishonest was afoot is hard to counter even if that perception is wrong.

Efforts to manage wildlife under the already controversial Endangered Species Act have been hurt by the seven federal and state scientists who sent bogus lynx-hair samples to a lab. This stunt plays into the hands of those who oppose the ESA.

Even if, as claimed, the bogus hairs were not counted in the final reports on lynx presence in the Wenatchee and Gifford Pinchot national forests, it casts a discrediting shadow over legitimate scientific efforts to figure out where the animals live.

If the threatened animals do live in those two forests, it potentially could restrict some human activities in the lynx habitat, such as, say, snowmobiling or logging. But the hairs purported to have been found in those two forests instead came from captive lynx.

One Forest Service scientist, who claimed the planted hair had been clearly labeled and the lab informed, said two years of conflicting lab results prompted the move.

Just as ill advised as the scientists' submitting the bogus hairs without clearance from their supervisors is their supervisors' behavior in dealing with the hoax perpetrated by the perps: two U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees, two Washington state Department of Fish and Wildlife employees and three employees of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest.

They were "counseled" and removed from the lynx project and won't work on a lynx project again. But will they work on, say, a wolf or grizzly project?

The agencies plead that it's a "personnel matter" and thus names and punishments must be kept from the public. Au contraire.

Wrist-slapping is not how to restore public confidence in these agencies' efforts to learn where endangered wildlife lives. Some members of Congress want an investigation, and a full public airing may be the only way to restore confidence in the validity of the agencies' scientific data collection.


One Forest Service scientist, who claimed the planted hair had been clearly labeled and the lab informed, said two years of conflicting lab results prompted the move.

This seems to be the earliest mention that the biologists in question told their superiors and that the lab had also been told. Also it implies that they were put into the sample vials ("had been clearly labeled") and not placed on the scratching posts in the wild.

7 posted on 12/31/2001 10:05:22 PM PST by jennyp
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To: Carry_Okie
How did they get the samples? Where are the requisitions? Fax records? Trip reports? Milage records? Where is the chain-of-custody document so common in such studies? Has anyone locked the files and sealed the computers?

If the FS people's story is true, this was a pigheaded, unauthorized action by the field biologists who simply wanted to show up the lab.

Stories have mentioned an investigation. Do you know if it's available online somewhere?

8 posted on 12/31/2001 10:08:32 PM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
(Oops, hit Reply too soon) Since it was a reckless unauthorized act done by the skeptical low level researchers, there was no good chain of custody or documentation.
9 posted on 12/31/2001 10:10:39 PM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
There's an acronym for what's happening here - CYA. With each new article their stories become even more preposterous. After all these years of watching the professional liar from Hope, the amateurs are easy to spot.
10 posted on 12/31/2001 10:10:42 PM PST by kitchen
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To: sauropod
but the gist was that, at a public meeting, the FS announced that they were going to make the Routt a lynx study area. When the audience pointed out that there was nothing for them to eat, the FS replied, "Ya, so what?" It isn't really about lynx; it's about banning motorized vehicles, chainsaws, hunting, etc.

Perhaps. Please understand, I'm not denying that it could be a fraud by the FS people. But after reading the Seattle Times story, the original story from the Wash. Times - where the claim of hair placed on the scratching posts first appeared - suddenly set off my BS detectors.

Do you think the hair was placed on the scratching posts, or was it put into sample vials?

11 posted on 12/31/2001 10:14:09 PM PST by jennyp
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To: kitchen
Yep, your right, and it's sad to see that cancer spreading ever more rapidly through the government and its bureaucrats. I attribute the increase to Slick and Slickette.
12 posted on 12/31/2001 10:20:40 PM PST by Navy Patriot
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To: jennyp
The problem is that, as a scientist, you can't have it both ways. These people know that. To claim that one is so diligent, so careful, that one is willing to take the extraordinary step of spending precious project dollars to validate the lab before ANY field samples are acquired and at the same time be unable to produce documents describing the planned validation procedure strains credulity. If it was a lab certification or screening effort, in advance of the study, there would be internal USFS memos to that effect. One cannot justify the PO without it as there would have to be grounds for either terminating the contract or refusing payment for bad analytical work.

The goal of validating the lab is to verify accurate identification at the time the accuracy of the analytical data must be unquestionable. The usual procedure would be to combine actual samples from the forest along with the "controls." Instead they chose to proceed in this ad hoc manner that leaves them the option to claim that the samples were found in situ (if they don't get caught by the lab). If the lab does detect the discrepancy, our USFS deep ecologists can claim that they were being really "diligent" by "testing" the lab. Yet to so proceed without a write-up casts doubt on the entire study. Why would they risk that if they were so determined to be "careful"?

Unfortunately, there are more problems with these claims as I suggested earlier. How did they obtain the "dummy" samples of known lynx hair from so far away without records of the request? If they submitted the samples as controls, where is the documentation of that fact? Something, anything... Nubers on the vials? Notes in a lab notebook? A PO?

As I understand it, some of the individuals involved in this case were also involved in the corrupt farce that is the "science" underlying a clear taking of private property in the Klamath Basin. If that is true, there are motive, means, opportunity, and a pattern of behavior that would be concurrent with fraudulent act. Such would benefit an economic interest on the part of (surprise!) the timber industry (such as International Paper, Georgia Pacific, and Weyerhauser). These companies do not want timber from National Forests depressing the prices from their private forests, which is one reason that they have been so generous to environmental NGOs. Has there been a grant from the foundations of any major stockholders in these companies for this study or to "volunteer" advocates of the lynx?

13 posted on 12/31/2001 10:47:51 PM PST by Carry_Okie
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To: Carry_Okie
We're off to drink in the New Year. Whether I'll be able to read your post afterwards is anybody's guess. =:-)

Talk to you next year...

14 posted on 12/31/2001 10:53:36 PM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
Most of your enviro experts are either incompetent or lazy. In my state, a press release in our state's leading paper, heralded the hatching of the first bald eagle since 1915. The chick was banded by some buffoons from the state wildlife agency.

A couple of months later, a report was made that the skeletal remains of the chick was found at the bottom of the tree supporting the nest. The reason for the chick's demise was unknown.

To make a long story short, we had eagles nesting in our area in the 1930's and we used to climb up on an overlooking hill and watch the mothers take care of their chicks.

We were warned by our parents not to go near the nests because our scent would cause the eagles to abandon the nest and cause the death of the chicks.

Since, I have learned that this rule governs most animals in the wild for the preservation of the parents is more important than the single litter or hatch. We see banding and harassing of wild species by wildlife experts and reports of the fragile balance of nature. Most of it is caused by stupidity on the part of these experts that do not know their animals.

15 posted on 12/31/2001 11:31:42 PM PST by meenie
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To: jennyp
If I were to put my cynical hat on, I'd say that there must have been some hanky-panky in the 1998 survey that was thrown out. I don't understand how the results could have been ruined at the lab as is claimed in the article. Did they misidentify bear hair as lynx? Below an article from 1999 that describes the procedure used in Oregon.

In search of the elusive lynx

It sounds to me that someone was seeding these traps with lynx hair in 1998. They just overdid it.

16 posted on 01/01/2002 12:04:38 AM PST by Dan Cooper
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To: jennyp
Surprisingly lucid after 2 glasses of champaigneee...

Jere's tje tacoma news Tribune article. Whoa, room spinnnninggggg

Um, I'm looking for a newspaper that isn't just going off the Wash. Times and/or AP stories & adding their own commentary...


December 23, 2001

The News Tribune

Lynxgate this is not.

Critics of efforts to protect the Canada lynx gleefully pounced on last week's disclosure that a handful of wildlife biologists planted captive fur samples in a federal survey of the cat's historic range. But the news hardly discredits the science being done to document the lynx' current habitat in the northern United States. At worst, it exposes the dishonesty of those seven biologists. At best, it exposes their unbelievable foolishness.

Right now, foolishness would seem to be the likely explanation. The survey in question is an annual affair that involves collecting fur samples from the wild and sending them to a laboratory for DNA analysis. According to the official story, the biologists were doubtful about the laboratory's ability to identify lynx fur; they decided to test the analysis by submitting samples from captive lynxes, including fur gathered from the lynx exhibit at Northwest Trek. The captive samples were included with batches of fur collected in Washington's Wenatchee and Gifford Pinchot national forests.

In support of this version, the agencies involved - the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the state Department of Fish and Wildlife -Êsay that the bogus samples were not counted in the survey, which reportedly showed no lynx presence in either national forest. If true - and a new investigation should get to the bottom of the story - the episode is something less than a scandal. No harm, no foul.

Even so, the foolishness remains. Jeff Koenings, the director of the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, announced on Thursday that he had barred the two state biologists involved from further research, noting that their actions were "extremely embarrassing" and "unprofessional."

Based on the evidence, Koenings' response seems about right. Threatened species research has real consequences: Habitat findings can lead to restrictions on logging and other activities that support human life. In the political realm, such restrictions can only be justified with rock-solid science. Blunders or deceptions that undermine the public's faith in that science do no favor to the Canada lynx and other wild creatures.

17 posted on 01/01/2002 12:30:33 AM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
Here's an AP article I didn't see posted here before. This was from 12/22/2001...
Two state biologists barred from research over lynx hoax


Associated Press

OLYMPIA -- Two state Department of Fish and Wildlife biologists who sent misleading lynx hair samples for DNA testing will be barred from further research work, their boss said.

Fish and Wildlife director Jeff Koenings said Thursday he was "angry and dismayed" that biologists Tom McCall and Jeff Bernatowiez breached proper scientific protocol while working with federal agencies to survey lynx populations.

"I spent many years training to become a biologist and consider this a slap in the face to myself and other biologists," Koenings said. "Our integrity and professionalism is now being questioned because of the arrogant actions of a few."

Seven state and federal biologists admitted that fur from captive Canadian lynx was added about a year ago to samples from the Wenatchee and Gifford Pinchot national forests, which are not known to have populations of the reclusive cats.

The scientists said they wanted only to ensure the accuracy of the lab's DNA analyses.

The U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have refused to release the names of the five federal biologists who submitted samples.

Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman Doug Zimmer said his agency has no plans to further discipline the federal biologists involved, though that could change if new information comes out during an investigation by the Interior Department's inspector general.

The Forest Service investigation recommended counseling, and that was done, he said.

"In terms of discipline, it's not that huge an issue internally," Zimmer said.

Koenings' three chief scientists said an independent Forest Service investigation determined that one biologist submitted hair samples from a tanned bobcat pelt for DNA testing in 1999, making up a site number that did not correlate with the national survey numbers.

In 2000, a second biologist submitted a sample from a captive lynx, using a site number from the study but keeping personal records noting the hairs were collected from a captive lynx.

The scientists said the two biologists questioned the accuracy of DNA analyses after the 1998 lynx survey identified lynx in portions of Western Washington and in Oregon using DNA testing.

"It's a way of testing if a lab knows what it's doing," Zimmer said Monday from his office in Lacey. "It was not an attempt to put lynx where they're not."

The action has raised suspicion by timber and recreation groups about the government's intentions in a study of the rare animal's range.

Koenings said even though the samples were never used as part of the study and didn't affect land-use restrictions, the biologists' actions cannot be tolerated.

"What they did will undoubtedly cause many to question the integrity of other important research being conducted by our department and other natural resource agencies," he said. "And that's a shame."


Koenings' three chief scientists said an independent Forest Service investigation determined that one biologist submitted hair samples from a tanned bobcat pelt for DNA testing in 1999, making up a site number that did not correlate with the national survey numbers.

See? It's this kind of detail that tells me it was simply a stupid move by a skeptical researcher. If he wanted to skew the results, he'd have used a real site number.

This sounds like this incident mentioned in the Seattle Times article:

A state fish and wildlife biologist also sent in a hunk of a bobcat pelt in his office.

When the results for the bobcat pelt came back as unidentifiable, the biologist, Tom McCall, didn't try to keep its origin a secret. He laughed and said, "Those samples were taken from old Harry."

Now the other incident, by the Federal biologists, is problematic:

In 2000, a second biologist submitted a sample from a captive lynx, using a site number from the study but keeping personal records noting the hairs were collected from a captive lynx.

18 posted on 01/01/2002 12:48:07 AM PST by jennyp
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To: jennyp
" there was no good chain of custody or documentation."

All activities show up in notebooks, field logs, or whatever they use. If the details don't show up there then it's fraud.

This story reads like pure spin. Control samples are always known only by the sender. All samples are labeled so as to ID them, but not reveal details to the lab they are sent to for analysis. There's no point to hanging control samples out for someone else to find them and turn them in as real, unless it's done by an outside agency that documents their actions.

"The unauthorized samples sent to the lab were segregated from valid field samples, so the survey was not skewed, according to the Forest Service."

Pure spin! Control samples are never handled this way.

"The first the lab learned of the unauthorized samples was in September 2000. A Forest Service biologist on his last day on the job before retirement phoned the lab to say biologists were concerned about how the survey was going, and were sending in fur from captive lynx as a control sample. Workers at the lab called the Forest Service, which launched an investigation last February that was completed in June, and determined that the survey was not skewed. The biologists were counseled, but not disciplined. "

This tidbit smells. It sounds like the lab is covering up the fact that they can't distinguish red from green. No one ever tells a lab they are sending control samples like this and folks that send controls are never counseled.

19 posted on 01/01/2002 1:14:15 AM PST by spunkets
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To: sauropod
envirofascism

Humm... that might be a keeper.

20 posted on 01/01/2002 1:58:48 AM PST by backhoe
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