Temporal Variation in Preferential Water Flow during Natural Vegetation Restoration on Abandoned Farmland in the Loess Plateau of China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is a basically interesting paper with limited novelty. It is about the well known and studied relationship among vegetation, soil porosity, and preferential flow.
The measured data would be useful for the readership of Land, however, the study has some flaws as follows:
The used methodology tries to describe a 3D process in 2D, which necessarily triggers the loss of information. It is not a serious problem but must be mentioned along the interpretation.
The used statistical methods are questionable. The authors consequently report differences where no significant differences were found. Moreover, I am not sure if all the reported significant differences are truly significant.
The results are overinterpreted. Many rough hypotheses and trivialities are discussed what makes the discussion chapter too long.
My additional comments are in the text attached.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear reviewer: Thank you for your comments that are valuable and helpful for revising and improving our paper. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Please see the attachment. We appreciate for your comments and suggestion earnestly. Sincerely, Author
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
LAND-653112 “Temporal variation in preferential water flow during natural vegetation restoration on abandoned farmland in Loess Plateau of China” Rui Wang, Zhibao Dong and Zhengchao Zhou
This paper describes the results of an infiltration experiment on abandoned farms to differentiate matrix and preferential flow in the near surface. It is very well put together and covers all of the important analyses for both the fluid content and distribution.
The most interesting part is in Figure 4 and Table 3, on pages 8 and 9. However, the description of the table contents is incorrect. The infiltration time (IT) is described as fastest in AF12 and AF25 but uses the values for AF3 and AF12. The fields of AF3 and AF12 are already described as being sandier and have much more uniform and rapid infiltration; see Table 3. This is hardly surprising as the surface layers are the most likely to be still under the influence of ploughing with a uniform upper layer of about the thickness of the rooting depth of the crops.
The authors should correct the text regarding Figure 4 and Table 3 on page 8 lines 262-272, and any other inferences drawn later in the paper.
Author Response
Dear reviewer: Thank you for your comments that are valuable and helpful for revising and improving our paper. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Please see the attachment. We appreciate for your comments and suggestion earnestly. Sincerely, Author
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper is improved significantly, however, some minor flaws are still present such as
It is impossible to identify the experimental sites in the watershed based on Fig 1.
L. 172. unite style
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
