Effects of Mustard Invasions on Soil Microbial Abundances and Fungal Assemblages in Southern California

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript of Wakefield and coworkers is an interesting, however slightly on-sided and incomplete contribution on the knowledge of soil microbiome in southern California affected by plant assemblages. The incompleteness comes from neglecting a detailed soil physico-chemical analysis, strange enough the authors concentrate on the allelopathic effect of the invasive and native plant species, but do not analyze even the known allelochemicals. However, let us go sequentially.

The title is somewhat misleading. The analysis of „microbial assemblages” means in reality a deeper insight on fungi, but nearly not at all on bacteria, protozoans, etc. The only investigation related to bacteria was the determination of active/total „cell numbers”. Think about changing the title for a more informative version.

The abstract is correct, though it is disappointing that the author do not know the spelling of the Latin name of the short-pod mustard.

lines 39-40. ? Seed banks, and the germination of the seed bank species is not the same!

line 53. Rephrase!

lines 59-60. Why only leaf litter? Stems do not contain sinigrin?

line 75. Spelling of the quoted author!

line 83. Spelling of the Latin name again!

The materials and methods are described more or less adequately. However, key soil physicochemical parameters are missing. Such as soil moisture, which may deeply influence the percentage of active microbes. Moreover the description of the soil type, and chemistry. I mean, e.g. whether carbonates are present, or not. This may influence the SOM determination based on loss on ignition method. We get no indication on the screening of the soil samples before the microbiome analysis. What about rhizosphere soil effect? Unfortunately, the fungal and bacterial enumeration methods are not described (lines 156-162). What is in the background of the outlier character of the Bonelli Park sample, etc?

lines 114-115. Rephrase!

line 165. „without optimal incubations”?

lines 193-198. The timing of irrigation is good, but the amount of water would be more informative.

line 207. The method of analysis fails!

The description of the results is adequate

line 316. Rephrase!

The discussion is again a bit one-sided. Why are the microbial (rather fungal) data not analyzed in total?

Author Response

Please see attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The reviewed manuscript is innovative and, apart from cognitive values, can have practical significance, consisting in the use of native communities to limit the development of foreign species. Hypotheses and their verification are a great value of the reviewed manuscript.

 Lines 100-105: A map with the distribution of research plots would be welcome

Line 350: is ...Cailfronia shoud be....California

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The manuscript entitled " Effects of mustard invasions on soil microbial assemblages in southern California" aims at evaluating how mustard invasions are impacting soil microbial assemblages in Southern California. Here, mustard species, mainly Hirshfeildia incana, are becoming widespread and abundant, and authors explored microbial abundance and assemblage structure in soil collected in three sites, both from intact CSS and in adjacent mustard dominated areas. Authors also explored the differences in seed banks between CSS and mustard soils.

The introduction is clear and presents well the background of research, the state-of-the art and the aim.

Material and methods is well separated in sub-sections, which makes the study easy to understand.

Both Results and Discussion sections are well written and complete each other. Results are clearly presented with Tables and Figures, and the used statistics is appropriate.

Overall, the manuscript is well written and interesting.

 

There are some minor corrections to perform:

Check for double spaces, i.e. Lines 62, 122, 189 and so on

Line 181: you mention Supplemental File 1, but the attached file is named “Table 3”; please check

Line 189: ate/at

Line 350: Cailfronia/California

Line 466: close the parenthesis

Lines 473-476: this is a repetition that you already inserted in Funding session

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript has been changed sufficiently. Just two remarks.

The first according to the parent material differences of the plots in close vicinity. The authors are convinced, that the carbonate content, etc. must be the same. I am currently sitting in a room with windows on a hill covered by an open grassland. I see pathes in close vicinity (some meters) where dolomite or limestone determines the vegetation...

Secondly, what concerns the fungal diversity. Why only higher taxa are discussed (like e.g. Pucciniomycotina). Based on ITS sequence analysis even genera could be identified, I guess.

There are new typo's added (e.g. lines 181, 205, 400, 546) to the text. Please correct them all...

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx