Investigations of human impacts on intertidal shellfish communities has become an important area of inquiry for archaeologists working in coastal regions around the globe. A recent study by Thakar et al. (2015) addresses this research agenda, but fails to recognize and accurately characterize earlier studies designed to investigate regional and deep temporal patterning of mussel size fluctuations on California's Northern Channel Islands. Here, we clarify the scope and scale of these earlier efforts and offer caution when interpreting the implications of Thakar et al.'s conclusions.
