Documenting patterns of spatio-temporal change in hyper-diverse
communities remains a challenge for tropical ecology, yet is
increasingly urgent as some long-term studies have shown major declines
in bird communities even in relatively undisturbed sites. In 1982,
Terborgh et al. quantified the structure and organization of the bird
community in a 97-ha. plot in southeastern Peru. We revisited the same
plot in 2018 and repeated the same intense combination of methodologies
as the original study in order to evaluate community-wide changes.
Contrary to the results from studies elsewhere, we found little change
in bird distribution and abundance within the plot, although there were
some declines related to loss of mixed-species flocks with a high level
of species interdependence. This apparent stability suggests that
large-scale forest reserves such as Manu National Park may provide the
conditions necessary for establishing refugia from at least some of the
effects of global change on birds.