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OOiJ129 Wilderness areas are subject. Yet none of the degrada- tional changes that it has been surmised precipitation management might entail ~ distrubance of the natural community of life, outbreaks of pestilence or disease, elimination of species, reduction of the wilderness gene pool, damaging erosion, interference with access, etc. - none of them was reported to have occurred as a result of (or even in association with) these climatic swings. "The vari ation of weather over periods shorter than a decade, all the way down to daily and hourly weather changes is substantially greater. It exceeds to an enor- mous degree the effects of cloud seeding. In fact, a quarter-century of controversy over whether or not cloud seeding is effective springs mainly from the difficulty of recognizing 'observable artificiality' in any given seeded weather even or even in whole seasons of seeded weather. It is only through extensive statistical comparison that the effects of weather modification on precipitation amounts have become discernible. It follows that the effects of cloud seeding on precipitation have not intro- duced 'observable artificiality' into any area subject to weather modification and no such effect on Wilderness areas is to be anticipated. "The expectation of an 'observable artificiality' in the response of the natural community of life to weather modification is even more remote because of the many other influences (some of them mentioned above) the effects of which become confused with those of weather. For example, although the survival rate of nestling birds is greatly affected by weather, it has not been found possible to relate more than a small part of the total variability of the population of a given bird species to weather factors. Similar results have come from the study of elk, small mammals, wood production in forests, etc. It is over- whelmingly apparent from these environmental and ecological studies that weather modification by presently available techniques does not have the capability for causing observ- ably artificial changes in the ecological environment, even when the most sensitive direct and indirect means of measurement and analysis (including statistical analysis) are used. "In the f ace of these many i nfl uences, the community of life in a Wilderness area is not static. Wildlife popula- tions fluctuate widely, for reasons very imperfectly understood but in which weather is only one of many fac- tors. The flora exhibit successional stages of recovery from catastrophic disturbances such as wildfire, land- slide, pestilence, drought, and gradual, subtle changes in response to the more gradual disturbances such as climatic 32 ~