The First Fossil Representatives of the Sawfly Genera Emphytus and Empria from the upper Miocene of France (Hymenoptera, Tenthredinidae)^†

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is a nice and interesting contribution to the knowledge of fossil sawflies, and I strongly recommend its publication. The manuscript is original and of high quality, well presented and containing very relevant new data. Anyway, I have highlighted some comments (see attached revised ms as pdf file) about presentation of data, e.g., the discussion provided for each treated species should be shorten, avoiding a too long (only descriptive) taxonomic discussion. In my opinion, it would be preferable to only highlight the characters that support the generic placement, avoiding such a long discussion, apparently mainly based on literature data and without useful consequences for a review of Allantinae (with the two treated tribes) generic arrangement. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

e.g., the discussion provided for each treated species should be shorten, avoiding a too long (only descriptive) taxonomic discussion. In my opinion, it would be preferable to only highlight the characters that support the generic placement, avoiding such a long discussion, apparently mainly based on literature data and without useful consequences for a review of Allantinae (with the two treated tribes) generic arrangement. 

answer:

Dear colleagues

Indeed, we would prefer to keep the discussion, because there is no global key or list of characters of the various extant genera, and thus the only way to accurately discuss the positions of the two fossils is to compare with all the genera ....

Reviewer 2 Report

It looks that the genus assignments of the two fossils is pretty well justified, although perhaps not entirely certain. Please consider additional comments in the attached ms.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear colleagues

We have followed all the remarks of the referee,

the changes are indicated in red in the text

especially, we have precised the putative affinities of the fossil Empria with the candidata-group

we have just kept the information on the outcrops in the material and methods, as traditionally done

thanks a lot for the kind help