Art Wilder is an ecologist working in Montana’s Crazy Mountains. He studies the elusive lynx, an endangered species of cat. His research is controversial because any land shown to be a lynx habitat becomes protected, and then cannot be logged or developed. When someone plants lynx hairs at Art’s survey sites, Art has to make a crucial decision: let the false data show that lynx are found in
great numbers, thereby protecting the land, or defend the credibility of science.