Dynamic Patterns of the Vertical Distribution of Vegetation in Heihe River Basin since the 1980s

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Journal: Forests (ISSN 1999-4907)

Manuscript ID: forests-1387768

Title: Dynamic patterns of vegetation vertical distribution in Heihe River Basin since 1980s

 

Overall  Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 

Dear authors,

Regarding dynamic patterns of vegetation vertical distribution in Heihe River Basin, this manuscript could be interesting for relevant researchers such as ecologist. The overall manuscript is structured well so there is no specific lack of contents. However, I would like to point out some methods and results which made this manuscript a bit less convincing. I would rely the decision on the Editors with the importance and objectivity of the following points. I think it can be published with revision. My specific comments are as follows. I wish peer reviewers’ comments help authors to improve the manuscript.

 

Point 1.

A spatial resolution of 500 m in the Heihe River Basin could be quite large to analyze these results. I wonder if there is other option with high resolution. If not, some other references of 500 m spatial resolution in the Heihe River Basin might be able to support the current analysis.

 

Point 2.

The correlation analysis seems strong for some vegetation zone, but the others does not. Due to the lack of sample points, it may not be so persuasive at this moment. In order to bring the general ideas from the statistical output, the number of samples and replicates should be sufficient to conclude that argument. In this point of view, one may still doubt the results although some presented strong correlation.

 

Point 3.

I recommend authors to aggregate or reduce the number of tree species in Figure 1. It is almost impossible to identify each species in the Figure with colors. Authors may be able to put the species together into genus or any other species group which author would assign.

In addition, I suggest authors add the china or small-scale map as a background map together with Heihe River Basin map. It will help to understand the location and geography better.

 

Point 4.

In Fig. 2, the Y axis title should be correct.

Also, in Table 3 (not Tab), all abbreviations must be explained in detail with note. Elevation (m) is more coherent than elevation/m. I still wonder if the elevation interval of 100 m was the best analytic approach.

 

Point 5.

Because the current results are quite straightforward and simple, what about reporting together with the other results which authors mentioned in the last part of discussion? Overall, I consider this manuscript has no strong drawback, but the methods and results are not so persuasive although some are interesting.

 

Kind regards,

Reviewer

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1, thank you for your great comments for improving the quality of our manuscript. The original manuscript was revised and improved, and fully recreated the figures in the revised manuscript. The responses to each of your comments are as follows.

 Comment 1: A spatial resolution of 500 m in the Heihe River Basin could be quite large to analyze these results. I wonder if there is other option with high resolution. If not, some other references of 500 m spatial resolution in the Heihe River Basin might be able to support the current analysis.

Response: Thank you for your comments. The Data collection and processing was rewritten in the revised manscript. In this paper, the basic data for updating the vegetation data in 2010s include the original vegetation types data in 1980s, 410 vegetation samples collected in the field from 2011 to 2015 (Figure 1), and multi-resolution remote sensing data obtained from Google Earth platform. The spatial data of original vegetation in 1980s was downloaded from the Science Data Center for Cold and Arid Regions (http://westdc.westgis.ac.cn), which involves 79 plant species. The 410 vegetation samples are distributed in the upper, middle and lower reaches, which cover all types of plant species in Heihe River Basin. The remote sensing data include the resolutions from 2.5m to 30m, which were obtained by image zooming in the different levels that need to recognize the plant type (Figure 1). Moreover, the update process of vegetation also was detailly described in the revised manuscript.

Comment 2: The correlation analysis seems strong for some vegetation zone, but the others does not. Due to the lack of sample points, it may not be so persuasive at this moment. In order to bring the general ideas from the statistical output, the number of samples and replicates should be sufficient to conclude that argument. In this point of view, one may still doubt the results although some presented strong correlation.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. In the revised manuscript, the related contents were deleted. In order to better analyze the relationship between vegetation change and climate in the different elevation zones, the part of the response of vegetation change to climate was rewrote, and the figure 8 of change trends vegetation, MAB and TAP in the different zones was added.

Comment 3: I recommend authors to aggregate or reduce the number of tree species in Figure 1. It is almost impossible to identify each species in the Figure with colors. Authors may be able to put the species together into genus or any other species group which author would assign. In addition, I suggest authors add the china or small-scale map as a background map together with Heihe River Basin map. It will help to understand the location and geography better.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. According to your comments,

1) the figure 1 in the original manuscript was remade to Figure 2 of the revised manuscript, in which the number of plant species was aggregated, and the longitude and latitude information was added.

2) In the part of study area, the Figure 1 was added, which not only presents the field sample point, terrain, the boundaries of lower reaches, middle reaches, upper reaches and the whole Heihe River Basin, but also shows the adjacent area.

 Comment 4: In Fig. 2, the Y axis title should be correct. Also, in Table 3 (not Tab), all abbreviations must be explained in detail with note. Elevation (m) is more coherent than elevation/m. I still wonder if the elevation interval of 100 m was the best analytic approach.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. According your comments, the elevation intervals of 10m, 50m, 100 m, 200m are respectively tested to explore the correlations between vegetation change and climate, but all the test results are not very good. Thus, the other description mode was selected in the revised manuscript. The detail revisions could be seen in the section 3.5 and 4.2. Moreover, the figure 2 in the original manuscript was remade to the figure 5 “changed area of 10 typical plant species in the different elevation zones”, and the table 3 was replaced by figure 8.

Comment 5: Because the current results are quite straightforward and simple, what about reporting together with the other results which authors mentioned in the last part of discussion? Overall, I consider this manuscript has no strong drawback, but the methods and results are not so persuasive although some are interesting.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. In order to advance the interesting of this paper, the original manuscript has been almost completely rewritten from the abstract to conclusions, and fully remade the figures in the revised manuscript.

Thank you very much again for your consideration.

Sincerely yours,

Zemeng Fan

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Author, 
Please incorporate the requested comments in the next version of manuscript

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2, thank you for your great and comments for improving the quality of our manuscript. The original manuscript was revised and improved, and fully recreated the figures in the revised manuscript. The responses to each of your comments are as follows. 

 Comment 1: The manuscript has no line number. Please consider inserting line number.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. It’s done in the revised manuscript. 

Comment 2: Abstract: Abstract of this article is well written with some introduction of research, numerical result and nice concluding remarks. Some issues: • In the starting line of Abstract instead of “The vegetation vertical distribution” it would be appropriate to use “The vertical distribution of vegetation” • In the same sentence change and difference has same meaning so please remove either change or difference. • In the same sentence is the author unknown of the change before 1980s or they have no information about such change. Please remove such statement. • In the sentence starting with Moreover, due to explicitly……….. please shorten the sentence and maybe you can use “To establish the relationship between vegetation and climate change” rather than using long sentence. • The same comment: the sentence is long for “The mean annual biotemperature (MAB) and total annual average precipitation (TAP).

Response: Thank you for your great comments. According your careful guidance, the abstract has been completely rewritten in the revised manuscript. 

Comment 3: introduction

The author should restructure the introduction. Here in my point of view, the author should first describe Plant physiology and its relationship with environment and other biophysical variables, climate change and its effect on vegetation and so on.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. According your careful guidance, the introduction has been completely rewritten in the revised manuscript.

• In introduction the sentence starting with “The spatial distribution of vegetation type… please use etc as plant growth also depends on other factors such as humidity, latitude or include all of them.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, it’s done in the revised manuscript.

• The sentence immediately after the above sentence in introduction is very long. Please rephrase it into multiple short sentences.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the related sentences has been modified.

• The sentence starting with “ The spatio-temporal pattern of vegetation distribution tends to undergo…..” after the comma please rephrase as “indicators for studying the quantitative impact and response of vegetation due to climate” and remove all other.

Response: Thank you four careful guidance, the related sentence has been revised.

• The sentence starting with “ In the sentence immediately after the above sentence please rephrase as: “At present, large number of studies establish relationship between vegetation and climate by considering biophysical variables such as sunshine duration, ppt, slope, Kira’s warmth index etc.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the related sentence has been changed.

• Please write the second paragraph into the study area rather than in the introduction.

Response: Thank you for great comments, the related content has been moved to the study area, and the other information of Heihe River Basin has been added in the revised manuscript.

• The starting sentence of climate change in third paragraph should be in first paragraph after the description of the plant properties and its interaction with environment.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, it was modified.

• The result of the study should not be present in the Introduction section. Please remove the sentence “Our result reveal that the divergent………”.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, it was deleted.

• You have not highlighted what is the novel point of this study in the introduction section. Please justify my concern and provide the strong novelty point in the introduction section.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the third paragraph of the introduction has been completely modified on the basis of your comments.

Comment 4: Methodology

The methodology section is somewhat unclear to me. I found it difficult to follow. I believe adding a schematic diagram would be beneficial. I recommend to add a section Study Area rather than describing the study area in the Introduction section. I see the map with detailed description, but you should show the reader where is Heihe River Basin in China please.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The 2.1 study area was added. In the revised manuscript, the Figure 1 not only presents the field sample point, terrain, the boundaries of lower reaches, middle reaches, upper reaches and the whole Heihe River Basin, but also shows the adjacent area. In addition, the key steps of the data collection and processing were respectively descried in the section 2.2.

• In the description of Google Earth (GE), I believe the image from GE has multiple sources and with different resolution and properties. There could be some errors if we utilize multiple sources (if I am correct). Please acknowledge this fact or provide description what methods have been applied to reduce such errors. I believe you also have ample amount of field validation. Thus, please utilize this strength to acknowledge such discrepancies. Also, I have some question regarding GE image. Have you applied machine learning techniques (as applied in past) to classify the image and determine the vegetation change? Also, could it be possible to describe about GE data in the introduction itself.

Response: Thank you for your great comments, in the section 2.2., The method of processing vegetation types has been added.

•    The Figure 1: Map of the vegetation distribution consists of a lot of information. However, multiple types of forest are indicated by same colour. May be could it be possible just to remake the map with 5-6 legends with same colour code for example say desert, grass, tree etc.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the figure 1 in the original manuscript was remade to the Figure 2 in the revised manuscript, in which the number of plant species was aggregated, and the longitude and latitude information was added.

• In the first sentence of Method section and throughout the manuscript: Please shorten the sentence into multiple short sentences.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the related sentences have been modified.

• For all the equation used please provide the appropriate reference of acknowledge that you invented the equation.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance, the related contents have been rewritten.

Comment 5: Result

The result section is ok but some more improvement could be done

Some issues:• In Table 1: please provide the colour coding as done in (https://doi.org/10.3390/ w12040961) or (https://doi.org/10.3390/w12082284).• In Table 3: Please change the table into multiple plots similar to (https://doi.org/10.3390/w12082284) if possible..

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The all tables in the original manuscript have been changed to the related figures on the basis of the references provide by you. And the results also have been modified.

Comment 6: Discussion: Please rectify the above comments before commencing to discussion and conclusion

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The discussion and conclusion have been rewritten according your all comments.

Thank you very much again for your consideration.

Sincerely yours,

Zemeng Fan

Reviewer 3 Report

General comments

This is a study of a percentage change in apparent vegetation types across a single area of the upper Heihe River Basin. The article does not clearly frame the structure of the analysis, or respect the limitations of the analysis in the discussion. A key limitation of the study is that there is no ground-truthing to establish the conditions of the vegetation types – a comparison of apparent extent of vegetation types is completed using satellite photography. Further, the study discusses aspects around relative sensitivity of vegetation communities to climactic variables, however as this study covers a single location this seems like over-reach.

The study has the potential to simply describe a comparison of change in modelled environmental parameters with modelled vegetation change across a single elevational gradient.

Should you wish to publish this article, I recommend that the manuscript undergo major revisions.

 

 

Specific comments

Abstract

First sentence would better read starting: “The vertical distribution of vegetation in the Heihe River Basin”

“Vertical belts” could perhaps be better referred to as “zones” or “elevational zones”?

“For quantitively explicating” could be better described as “To explore”

Generally Heihe River Basin needs a determiner.

“Moreover, due to explicitly analyze” suggest to delete this and replace with “To analyse”

Environmental parameters do not need a determiner.

“The results show that the total change area was” suggest replace with “The results show that vegetation type changed over an area of”

“Change area of vegetation” would be better referred to as “area of vegetation that changed”

“Increase of elevation altitude” Elevation and altitude are both used. I appreciate that across many scientific journals altitude is frequently used in place of elevation, but altitude is a parameter established through atmospheric pressure, and elevation measured in metres above sea level so elevation is the more appropriate of the two terms.

Introduction

Para 1. Lines 5–9. The methods of analysis are not particularly relevant to the theoretical background, suggest remove.

Para 1. Lines 13–16. A list of specific parameters is also overly specific for the first paragraph of the introduction where the theoretical framework for the article is being introduced.

Para 2. Line 8. What is meant here by weeds? Is this ecosystem invaded by non-native species or is this a reference to woody or herbaceous vegetation?

Para 2. Lines 9 – 10. Suggest remove shrubs from the list of scientific names and amend the sentence to read “The alpine shrubs and meadow belt dominated by the shrub species: …”

Para 2. Generally the word dominated is used very frequently – perhaps exchange for “consists of” or similar.

Para 3. What is the Ejina Banner? Sounds interesting…

Last Para. Line 9. “…divergent responds of vegetation…” This sentence is a little confusing: do you mean “Our results highlight the differing and divergent responses of vegetation to the changing climactic variables across the different elevational zones.”?

Methods

Para 1. Lines 1–2. This sentence is superfluous.

Para 1. Line 7. Was any ground-truthing undertaken to establish the species present in the vegetation zones in the new extent?

Para 2. Lines 1–7. This first sentence reads like a results statement and should perhaps not be in the methods?

Para 3. Line 1. “The spatial variation rates” is confusing – do you mean “The temporal change”? Also – you are calculating percentages and not rates.

Para 3. Line 2. The parameters you give here for 1980 and 2010 are t₀ and t₁ respectively. Yet in the equations and subsequent text you provide t₁₉₈₀ and t₂₀₁₀. Please amend to be consistent.

Para 5. Line 2. You use the term change rates again when you are calculating percentages. Please check this throughout the manuscript.

Results

Para 1. Line 4. What data do you have and what analyses are you undertaking for the Qilian Mountains? These are not referenced in the Methods. Further, what is meant by the belt pattern? My understanding of the methods section is that you did not carry out spatial analysis – so how is there a spatial pattern here?

Para 2. Lines 1–3. What spatial analysis was undertaken? This is not described in the methods.

Para 2. This paragraph reads more like an introductory paragraph – is this citing other work? I can’t relate this paragraph to the methods.

Para 3. Line 1. If this is an average percentage (not rate) of change, please provide the standard deviation values.

Para 4. Lines 8–10. This sentence goes from describing the results to making a very specific claim that is not supportable from the analysis. Comparing percentage change in area of ecosystems and the modelled environmental parameters in an area does not imply sensitivity to shifts in climate.

Table 2. Are these changes increases or decreases? Use negatives to show decreases as otherwise the reader has to refer to the text rendering this Table redundant.

Figure 2. The y-axis suggests that there are percentage changes in area of up to 800%. Further – the graph infers a decrease in farming above 3000 m – well outside the farming zone; the graph is misleading. Further the graph isn’t helpful as there is no indication of where these vegetation communities existed in the 1980s compared to where satellite photography shows them to exist now.

Paragraph 9. Lines 10–14. This statement contradicts the statement you make in Para 4 Lines 8–10. The vegetation change in the alpine desert meadow is the only zone that has change that is correlated to changes in precipitation. The statement also appears to contradict the model results in Table 3 which suggests that there are significant correlations between percentage change in vegetation types per elevational zone and changes in environmental parameters.

Discussion

Para 1. Lines 1–7. This first sentence is not appropriate as the appropriateness of using GIS and satellite photography to examine change in vegetation was not tested by this article. The data from these resources was used for the analysis, but no ground-truthing was undertaken (as presented in the article) to confirm the nature of the vegetation on the ground. This is a massive assumption.

Para 2. This contradicts your results statements in Para 4 and Para 9. Further the data you present is correlations between percentage changes in distribution and climate and in particular, given that you report data from one site, it would be wise to moderate the language around sensitivity.

Para 3. There has been no analysis of transitional zones – or at least this has not been presented in a clear way. This paragraph is unsupported.

Conclusions

These are re-written discussion points and a results paragraph, and do not add to the story.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3, thank you for your careful and great comments for improving the quality of our manuscript. The original manuscript was revised and improved, and fully recreated the figures in the revised manuscript. The responses to each of your comments are as follows. 

Comment 1: Abstract: First sentence would better read starting: “The vertical distribution of vegetation in the Heihe River Basin”. “Vertical belts” could perhaps be better referred to as “zones” or “elevational zones”? “For quantitively explicating” could be better described as “To explore” Generally Heihe River Basin needs a determiner. “Moreover, due to explicitly analyze” suggest to delete this and replace with “To analyse” Environmental parameters do not need a determiner.“The results show that the total change area was” suggest replace with “The results show that vegetation type changed over an area of”. “Change area of vegetation” would be better referred to as “area of vegetation that changed”.“Increase of elevation altitude” Elevation and altitude are both used. I appreciate that across many scientific journals altitude is frequently used in place of elevation, but altitude is a parameter established through atmospheric pressure, and elevation measured in metres above sea level so elevation is the more appropriate of the two terms.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The abstract in the revised manuscript has been modified according to your comments. 

Comment 2: Introduction

• Para 1. Lines 5–9. The methods of analysis are not particularly relevant to the theoretical background, suggest remove.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The related content was deleted.

• Para 1. Lines 13–16. A list of specific parameters is also overly specific for the first paragraph of the introduction where the theoretical framework for the article is being introduced.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The related sentences have been modified.

• Para 2. Line 8. What is meant here by weeds? Is this ecosystem invaded by non-native species or is this a reference to woody or herbaceous vegetation?

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. “weeds” has been modified to “forb grass” that refers to herbaceous vegetation.

• Para 2. Lines 9 – 10. Suggest remove shrubs from the list of scientific names and amend the sentence to read “The alpine shrubs and meadow belt dominated by the shrub species: …”

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The sentence was modified according your comments.

• Para 2. Generally, the word dominated is used very frequently – perhaps exchange for “consists of” or similar.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The related sentences were improved on the basis of your comments.

• Para 3. What is the Ejina Banner? Sounds interesting….

Response: Thank you for your attentions. Ejina Banner is a district in Inner Mongolia of China, which was marked in the figure 1 of the revised manuscript.

• Last Para. Line 9. “…divergent responds of vegetation…” This sentence is a little confusing: do you mean “Our results highlight the differing and divergent responses of vegetation to the changing climactic variables across the different elevational zones”?

Response: Thank you for your comments. The sentence was removed and the last paragraph of introduction was rewritten in the revised manuscript.

Comment 3: Methods

• Lines 1–2. This sentence is superfluous.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The sentence was removed, and the section of method have reorganized.

• Para 1. Line 7. Was any ground-truthing undertaken to establish the species present in the vegetation zones in the new extent?

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The related descriptions have been modified, and the section 2.2 of data collections and processing was added to explain how to obtain the vegetation types in the different elevation zones.

• Para 2. Lines 1–7. This first sentence reads like a results statement and should perhaps not be in the methods?

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. It was deleted.

• Para 3. Line 1. “The spatial variation rates” is confusing – do you mean “The temporal change”? Also – you are calculating percentages and not rates. Line 2. The parameters you give here for 1980 and 2010 are t0 and t1 respectively. Yet in the equations and subsequent text you provide t1980 and t2010. Please amend to be consistent. Para 5. Line 2. You use the term change rates again when you are calculating percentages. Please check this throughout the manuscript.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The method section was reorganized into 2.3 Classifciation of the vertical vegetation zone, 2.4 A dynamic index of vegetation distribution and 2.5 A spatial change index of climate elements. The all formulas were modified.

Comment 4: Results

• Para 1. Line 4. What data do you have and what analyses are you undertaking for the Qilian Mountains? These are not referenced in the Methods. Further, what is meant by the belt pattern? My understanding of the methods section is that you did not carry out spatial analysis – so how is there a spatial pattern here? Para 2. Lines 1–3. What spatial analysis was undertaken? This is not described in the methods. • Para 2. This paragraph reads more like an introductory paragraph – is this citing other work? I can’t relate this paragraph to the methods.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The method was revised. Based on your comments, the result section was reorganized into 3.1. Vertical distribution of vegetation, 3.2. Dynamic changes of vegetation types, 3.3. Change trends of vegetation in different elevation zones, 3.4. Dynamic changes of typical plant species in the different elevation zones, and 3.5. Change trends of climate in the different elevation zones.

• Para 3. Line 1. If this is an average percentage (not rate) of change, please provide the standard deviation values. Para 4. Lines 8–10. This sentence goes from describing the results to making a very specific claim that is not supportable from the analysis. Comparing percentage change in area of ecosystems and the modelled environmental parameters in an area does not imply sensitivity to shifts in climate.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The method was revised, and the related descriptions have been modified.

• Table 2. Are these changes increases or decreases? Use negatives to show decreases as otherwise the reader has to refer to the text rendering this Table redundant.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The table 2 was changed to figure 4, and the related content has been rewritten.

• Figure 2. The y-axis suggests that there are percentage changes in area of up to 800%. Further – the graph infers a decrease in farming above 3000 m – well outside the farming zone; the graph is misleading. Further the graph isn’t helpful as there is no indication of where these vegetation communities existed in the 1980s compared to where satellite photography shows them to exist now.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The area of Sympegma regelii desert was only 38km² and that was increased to 332.25km², which lead to the percentage change is very biggest. In order to better describe the changes of 10 typical vegetation in different elevation zones, the figure 2 in the original manuscript was changed to the figure 5 “changed area of 10 typical plant species in the different elevation zones”, and the related context was modified by the new compute method.

• Paragraph 9. Lines 10–14. This statement contradicts the statement you make in Para 4 Lines 8–10. The vegetation change in the alpine desert meadow is the only zone that has change that is correlated to changes in precipitation. The statement also appears to contradict the model results in Table 3 which suggests that there are significant correlations between percentage change in vegetation types per elevational zone and changes in environmental parameters.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. In order to better analyze the relationship between vegetation change and climate in the different elevation zones, the section of the response of vegetation change to climate was rewritten, and the figure 8 of change trends vegetation, MAB and TAP in the different zones was added.

 Comment 5: Discussion

• Para 1. Lines 1–7. This first sentence is not appropriate as the appropriateness of using GIS and satellite photography to examine change in vegetation was not tested by this article. The data from these resources was used for the analysis, but no ground-truthing was undertaken (as presented in the article) to confirm the nature of the vegetation on the ground. This is a massive assumption.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. On the basis of the modified methods, the section of 4.1. method of update vegetation data was added, and the related contents in the original manuscript were modified.

• Para 2. This contradicts your results statements in Para 4 and Para 9. Further the data you present is correlations between percentage changes in distribution and climate and in particular, given that you report data from one site, it would be wise to moderate the language around sensitivity.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The response of Vegetation Types to Climate in different elevation zones has been list as a sub section and the related contents had been revised.

• Para 3. There has been no analysis of transitional zones – or at least this has not been presented in a clear way. This paragraph is unsupported.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. combined with your comments, the related content was modified. Moreover, the descriptions of study area in the revised manuscript include that Heihe River Basin is a typical ecology transition zone. So, if possible, I want the related discussion by modified could be kept.

 Comment 6: Conclusions: These are re-written discussion points and a results paragraph, and do not add to the story.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The conclusions were completely rewritten.

Thank you very much again for your consideration.

Sincerely yours,

Zemeng Fan

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Journal: Forests (ISSN 1999-4907)

Manuscript ID: forests-1387768

Title: Dynamic patterns of vegetation vertical distribution in Heihe River Basin since 1980s

 

In the second rounding of peer-review

 

Overall  Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 

Dear authors,

Thank you for your response. I checked all the revisions and I considered that it has been updated much based on the previous comments. Most of the contents I was wondered about were not clear so there is no further issues. I just give you a short comment on Figure 3. The figure shows the comparison between 1980s and 2010s. Thus, I recommend authors to draw only one type of graph, e.g. bar chart. Also, horizontal bar chart could be an alternative option. Also, the decimal places on axis are not needed.

I appreciate author’s effort on this research.

 

Kind regards,

Reviewer

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1, Thank you for your affirmation to the previous revised manuscript, and the kindly guidance to help me further improve the manuscript. The detail responses to your comments are as follows.

 Comment : I just give you a short comment on Figure 3. The figure shows the comparison between 1980s and 2010s. Thus, I recommend authors to draw only one type of graph, e.g. bar chart. Also, horizontal bar chart could be an alternative option. Also, the decimal places on axis are not needed.

Response: Thank you for great comments. The Figure 3 was redrawn by your comment.

Thank you very much again for your great guidance and kindly consideration.

Sincerely yours,

Zemeng

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear author, 

You have invested valueable time to improve this paper. However, more improvement is required before the acceptance of this paper. 

Best regards,

Reviewer

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2, Thank you for your affirmation to the previous revised manuscript, and the great comments to help me further improve my manuscript. The responses to each of your comments are as follows. 

Comment 1: For the next version of manuscript please provide the continuous line number. Please don’t start with line number starting from number 1 in every page.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The continuous line number is provide in the second revised manuscript. 

 Comment 2: Abstract: I am happy with the abstract.

Response: Thank you for your affirmation. 

Comment 3: Introduction:

• Line 40 Page 1: Please shift this sentence to next paragraph where you have described about climate change. • Line 1 Page 2: Same as above comment.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The paragraph 1 and 2 of introduction were modified in the second revision according your careful guidance.  

• I found that section 4.1 as a more relevant problem statement than what you have presented. This is the main comment about the novelty as well, you are not properly highlighting the novelty statement of the research problem.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The related sentences in section 4.1 were modified and shifted to the introduction as a paragraph (to see the line 72-80), and other sentences were deleted in the second revision.  

Comment 4: Methodology: The author has made significant changes in this section, and it has significantly improved the manuscript. Please change the caption of Figure 2 which you have written Figure 1.

Response: Thank you for your affirmation and kindly guidance. It was modified.

Comment 5: Result: The result section needs improvement. Some issues:

• I don’t like placement of section 3.1 in the result section. I believe this is not a novel finding of your study. This information should either be removed or placed in the methodology section where you describe study area.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The related contents in the section 3.1 of the first revision were selected and moved to the methodology, and other sentences were deleted in the second revision.

• In the same section, the starting statement and the following sentence are of which year please make it clear.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The starting statement and the following sentences of results section were modified on the basis of your comments.

• Line 33 Page 5: I think there is no Figure 2 in your manuscript. Either there are two Figure 1 or directly Figure 3.

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. It was carefully checked and modified.

• I strongly recommend author to correct grammatical errors throughout the manuscript.

Response: Thank you for your great guidance. The grammatical errors were carefully checked, and the language was polished.

• Figure 3: Line 7 Page 7: The authors have said they observed increasing trend but haven’t disclosed it. Please provide numerical detail. • Same comment for Line 10 and 15 of the page 7.

Response: Thank you for your great comments. The related sentences were modified, and the numerical details were added in the second reversion.

• Figure 4 is very nice. Please improve labelling sentence for instance please rephrase it to “Vegetation area change” or “Change in vegetation”.

Response: Thank you for your affirmation and careful guidance. The labelling sentence in Figure4 was changed to Vegetation area change in the second reversion.

• Please rephrase the caption as Surface area change of 10 typical plant species with respect to elevation. The unit of Elevation should be m ASL (am I correct?).

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The caption of Figure.5 was rephrased as “Surface area change of 10 typical plant species with respect to elevation”. It’s sure that elevation is distance above sea level (ASL), and is usually measured in meters(m) or feet(ft). So, the unit of elevation is usually abbreviated as “m” in many journal papers.

Comment 6: Discussion: Please rectify the above comments before commencing to discussion and conclusion

Response: Thank you for your careful guidance. The discussion has been rewritten in the second revision on the basis of your comments.

• I don’t see the link between results and discussion, and this should be improved in the next version of the manuscript.

Response: Thank you for your great guidance. According to your comments, the discussion section was rewritten based on the results in the second revision.

• As mentioned before, section 4.1 should be shifted as a problem statement in the introduction.

  Response: Thank you for your great comments. the major contents in section 4.1 were modified and shifted to the introduction as a paragraph (to see the line 72-80), and other sentences were deleted in the second revision. 

• Line 10 Page 9: please rephrase it to “We utilized cost effective Google earth platform”.

Response: Thank you for your great guidance. This sentence was modified and move to the introduction section in the second revision.

• I don’t see connection between the Figures in result section and discussion why this happened and what that happened. The authors have vaguely described the discussion section. Please cross-reference your figure, to get us the reader a clear picture of what is novel results and in discussion what is the probable cause of such results.

Response: Thank you for your great guidance. The discussion section was rewritten based on the results. What that happened and why this happened of vegetation changes were discussed from the three perspectives of different elevation zones, typical plant specials, and the relationship between vegetation change and climate.

Thank you very much again for your great guidance and kindly consideration.

Sincerely yours,

Zemeng