The Spatial Pattern of the Upper Limit of Montane Deciduous Broad-Leaved Forests and Its Geographical Interpretation in the East Monsoon Realm of China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Review
The authors have corrected the paper according to my suggestions. I recommend that the paper be published as is.

Comments for author File: Comments.docx

Author Response

Thanks for your comments

Reviewer 2 Report

I have attached two files.  In the PDF manuscript file I have highlighted in yellow all the passages that required rewriting.  In the Word file I note the issues that need to be addressed by the authors.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Please see attached file.

Comments for author File: Comments.zip

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

We provide three files to show how we revised the manuscript in the re-submitted files：1) revised manuscript; 2) revised manuscript with tracked changes; 3) point-to-point responses to reviewer’s comments attached below.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Wang et al., Forests, MS 1258683:  The spatial pattern of the upper limit of montane deciduous broad-leaved forests and its geographical interpretation in the east monsoon realm of China.

The authors investigate the factors limiting the elevational distribution of montane deciduous broad-leaved forests across a wide latitudinal distribution of mountain peaks in eastern China. Factors include climate variables, latitude and longitude, mountain elevation or “height,” and  tree species’ cold tolerances. They divide the peaks into those that are tall enough to enable  climatic treeline, and those that are lower than forest tolerances but create a physical “summit syndrome,” resulting in lower tree limits.  They also divide the peaks into temperate zone and subtropical zone (Fig. 1).  The geographical or climate basis for that division should be made clear.  The authors examine these factors using individual linear regression models and then hierarchical multiple regression models. 

The objectives and results of the study are of interest, but more work is required to produce a publishable paper.  The following are the major problems, not necessarily in order of importance:

The contribution of this paper hinges on having valid data.  The authors, Lines 118-134, state that data came from a variety of sources, including journals, books, and reports, but these are not cited.  It would be proper to have a Supplementary table that listed all of these sources and data provided by each, and additional supplementary tables that provided all the data used for the analyses in this study, including the climate. Readers cannot judge the the data as it stands, and one of the first rules of writing a scientific paper is to provide readers with enough information that they can replicate the analyses that the authors performed, if they wished to do so.  

The variables used for this study should be listed in a table and defined carefully both in description and mathematically.  How were these variables calculated?  There is no explanation.  A good example is WI or warming index.  What does this measure and how is it calculated?  It is discussed several times in terms of its utility for prediction.

The captions to the figures and the table lack essential detail. Figures and tables need to be self-explanatory and able to stand alone.  This means that all abbreviations should be defined in each caption or refer to a previous caption and any additional information needed provided to interpret the information or data. If not obvious, the structure of the figures should be pointed out.  For example, in Fig. 1, I could not find the eight points that represented the climatic temperate treelines, and in Fig. 2 what are the colored points showing versus what the bars represent? A legend or explanation in the caption would help. Also, tables and figures need to be referenced when data from them are first mentioned in a paragraph and not at the end of the paragraph.  I found myself looking for the sources of the data.

The statistical analyses used in this paper needed to be explained in more detail in a section called “Statistical analyses” under section 2.0 Data and Method (Methods).  Instead, they were under 2.2 “Framework of this study” and then not until lines 172-178.  The use of simple linear regression was within a paragraph lines 169-171 without discussing what statistical platform was used for these, what was the objective (“used to fit the relationship” assumes there is a relationship). Secondly, the variables used for the hierarchical multiple regression analysis were not mentioned until section 3.5. 

An objective for a paper is not a discussion, as indicated in Lines 108-110, Objective 4. Instead, there should be a Discussion section in this paper beginning with section 4.0, as there is by convention in scientific papers. 

Also problematic, there are numerous writing issues, with typos, wrong word use, mis-spelled words (e.g., “Faugus”) confusion with singular vs. plural nouns, and irregular sentences. Scientific names by convention are italicized and they were not throughout the paper. There are many sentences that are unclear or confusing and convoluted.  Examples include “Data and method” (usually methods), Lines 51-53, 70-73, 94-97, 156-162, 234-236, 287-289, 312-313, 343-345, 356-358 and in many other places.  “Horizontal distribution” is used a lot but not defined—is this zonal or longitudinal?   In most cases I got the gist of the writing but it took some effort.

Reviewer 2 Report

Review

The spatial pattern of the upper limit of montane deciduous broad-leaved forests and its geographical interpretation in the east monsoon realm of China

 

The paper describes the factors affecting the upper limit of montane deciduous broad-leaved forests in China. The authors conducted hierarchical multiple regression to find the effect of climatic, topographic,  cold tolerance of tree species on the geographic pattern of the upper limit of montane deciduous broad-leaved forests. The study covers 75 mountains in the east monsoon realm of China. The results of the study are important for a better understanding of the distribution of tree species under climate change.

The paper is very well written. I only found a few errors. I suggest to publish it after minor revision.

Line 92 – Can you explain the warm index? How was it calculated?

Line 188 – the description of  the axes must be uniform MDB (m) or MDB/m.

Line  218 – bold

Line 284 – insert chapter name  Discussion

Line 295-296 – Is it correct?

Line 392 – China not Chins

Line 422 – Betula   not Betual