Whole-Plant Seedling Functional Traits Suggest Lianas Also Support “Fast-Slow” Plant Economics Spectrum

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please find my notes and highlighted comments on the attached file, some are as follows;  

Line 2-3: Please use uppercase for each word in the title, subtitles, and subheadings of each section

Line 38: of the resource 

 

Line 60: grow faster (Please delete “more”)

 

Line 74: to an expensive 

Line 82: At the root level, root tissue density was reported to be the most consistent below-ground trait and associated 82 with growth rate [33]. 

 

 

Line 90: on a tree

 

Line 95: These fast and acquisitive strategies 

 

Line 99: may not differ

 

Line 104: in the functional

 

Lines 118, 129, 143, and 160: Please double-check the journal requirements for the subheadings

Line 138: differences

 

References: Please double check the journal references formatting and follow the requirements

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thanks for your positive comments to our paper and your constructive suggestions to improve our paper. 

Please see the attachment for details

Best wishes,

Zhenhua SUN

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

 

The authors collected roots, stems and leaves of lianas and woody plants in the dry season. Differences in resource acquisition strategies between lianas and woody plants were detected. The authors first tested whether the trait is different between trees and lianas, and found that only SLA and SSL have significant differences. Then the authors conducted a clustering analysis of all species and compared the difference between the two clustering classes. The questions mainly include the following two aspects. Firstly, we hope that the authors will add in the introduction about the characteristics of juvenile lianas. Meanwhile, it is added why the dry season was chosen for the study. In addition, it is hoped that the authors will add the details of sampling. The specific details are as follows.

1.       Lines 53-64 The authors extensively describe the growth characteristics and resource acquisition properties of adult lianas. So, what are the characteristics of juvenile lianas and what is the need or peculiarities of the study. We do not learn about it here.

2.       Line 130 The dry season occurs from November-April and the authors' sampling was in May 2018. The authors focused on the functional traits of dry season lianas and the timing of sampling had a very strong influence on the authors' results. Why did you choose to set up the sample plots in May? There is less description of why the dry season is studied, which is a point of interest to us.

3.       Line138: In the forest, the difference between the growth environment of seedling individuals and adult individuals may cause differences in traits. Why did you choose seedlings do not choose adults? What was the definition of lianas seedling, also 10-100 cm?

4.       Line 139: Why was “outside of the plot?

5.       Lines 145-146 What type of instrument did the authors use to make the measurements? The authors should provide.

6.       Line 170-171: “PCA scores of the first three axes accounting for 74 % of the total variance”, where is the figure or table about this result?

7.       Lines 195-201 Is this a review from a previous expert? I'm not quite sure what your main purpose is with these comments.

8.       Line 262-263: “around half of liana species located on the resource conservative end of the “fast-slow” growth spectrum”. How to define the fast-slow” growth spectrum here?

9.       Line 337-342: The effect of the environment on trees and lianas at different stages may be different. For example, the effect of light on adult trees may be smaller than that on seedlings, but the effect of light on lianas may always be very large, which may change the results. I suggest that this part can be clarified directly in the introduction.

 

 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thanks for your positive comments to our paper and your constructive suggestions to improve our paper. 

Please see attachment for details.

Best wishes,

Zhenhua SUN

Author Response File: Author Response.docx