Populations are not declining and food webs are not collapsing at the Luquillo Experimental Forest

In PNAS, Lister and Garcia (1) report declines in abundances of understory arthropods and lizards between 1976 and 2012 and claim similar declines in populations of arthropods, frogs, and insectivorous birds based on data from the Luquillo Long-Term Ecological Research project (LUQ). Their conclusion, that increasing temperature has led to a collapse of the food web, has attracted considerable attention from public media, but this conclusion is not corroborated by empirical evidence from LUQ (see Supplementary Materials, https://luq.lter.network/pop-trends-yunque-luquillo). Also, the authors fail to consider the effects of hurricanes and subsequent changes during secondary succession. Lister and Garcia (1) interpret temporal changes in abundance of the walking stick ( Lamponius portoricensis ), canopy arthropods, frogs ( Eleutherodactylus coqui ), and birds at El Verde to be a consequence of increasing annual … [↵][1]1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: alugo{at}fs.fed.us. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1