1. Studies on the effects of human-driven forest disturbance usually
focus on either biodiversity or carbon dynamics but much less is known
about ecosystem processes that integrate trophic levels. Herbivory is
one fundamental ecological process for ecosystem functioning that
remains underexplored and is poorly quantified in human-modified
tropical rainforests. 2. Here, we present the results of the largest
study to date on the impacts of human disturbances on herbivory. We
quantified the incidence and severity of herbivory caused by chewers,
miners and gall-formers in 199,869 canopy leaf blades from 1,102 trees
distributed across 20 forest plots located along a gradient of human
disturbance in the Amazon. 3. We found that chewers dominated herbivory
incidence, yet were not a good predictor of the other forms of herbivory
either at the stem or plot level. Herbivory severity was correlated with
disturbance intensity, being greater at more disturbed sites. 4.
Synthesis. Although our large-scale study of canopy herbivory in
Amazonian forests suggests that human disturbance increases the severity
of leaf herbivory, effects were weak. Additionally, we found no effect
of human disturbance in incidence of leaf herbivory. These results
combined indicate that herbivory is a relatively resilient process to
human impacts.