Nutritional Status of Wood Melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in a Natural Forest Stand in South-Western Poland

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript entitled “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in 2 natural forest stands in south-western Poland” by Anna Paszkiewicz-Jasińska et al. presents an investigation into the nutritional composition of Melica uniflora. The study aimed to shed light on the nutritive value of this grass species for forest wildlife. While the research provides valuable insights, there are some areas that could be improved to enhance the overall quality of the study.

Comments:

-          All Latin names should be written in italics (Capreolus capreolus Line 59—60),  (Fagus L., Line 71), (Melica uniflora Line 74 and 79 ), (Deschampsia sp., Luzula luzuloides Line 124)…

-          The reference style in the journal is numerical; however, in the Materials and Methods section, a different reference style, which is not numerical, has been used. Please make the necessary correction to align the reference style in the Materials and Methods section with the numerical style employed by the journal (Lines: 104, 111,124—126, 136….).

-          What factors or considerations influenced the choice of two distinct dates, namely July and October, for their research or analysis?

-          The Materials and Methods section requires improvement. Specifically, regarding section "2.4. Weather conditions," the characterization of weather conditions is typically included as part of the "Study area characteristics." Generally, the characterization of an area of study relies on both soil characterization and weather condition characterization. Therefore, the content under "2.4. Weather conditions" should be incorporated within the "Study area characteristics" subsection. Furthermore, it is advisable to move the presentation of soil and weather data from the Materials and Methods section to the Results section. This change will enhance the organization and flow of the manuscript, ensuring that the data and findings are presented in a more appropriate and logical manner. Please make the necessary adjustments to reflect these suggestions and improve the structure and clarity of the manuscript.

-          Please refrain from beginning sentences with numbers (Line 156).

-          ANOVA analysis requires that the quantitative data follow a normal (Gaussian) distribution. In the opposite case, one must proceed to non-parametric tests (the Mann Whitney U test). It's better to specify all the validation conditions before the statistical exploration step the same remark for correlation studies. The normality of the quantitative data must be checked.

 

-          Ensure that the meaning of abbreviations used in the tables and figures is provided below each respective table or figure.

The quality of English writing in the manuscript is deemed acceptable. 

Author Response

Revision 1

Dear Respected Reviewer,

Thank you for your effort involved in preparing the review of our manuscript entitled: “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in natural forest stands in south-western Poland”. We have studied the comments carefully and made the correction in the text of manuscript.

Point 1. All Latin names should be written in italics (Capreolus capreolus Line 59—60),  (Fagus L., Line 71), (Melica uniflora Line 74 and 79 ), (Deschampsia sp., Luzula luzuloides Line 124)…

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

 

Point 2. The reference style in the journal is numerical; however, in the Materials and Methods section, a different reference style, which is not numerical, has been used. Please make the necessary correction to align the reference style in the Materials and Methods section with the numerical style employed by the journal (Lines: 104, 111,124—126, 136….).

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 3. What factors or considerations influenced the choice of two distinct dates, namely July and October, for their research or analysis?

Response: Thank you for your comment. Wild grass species play an important role in the rations of wild herbivores in natural forests by acting as a source of protein. The choice of two sampling dates for Melica uniflora plants was dictated by the desire to know the forage value of plants available to wild ruminants in the full growing season (in July) and before the winter period (in October), when animals are preparing for the period of food shortage.

Point 4. The Materials and Methods section requires improvement. Specifically, regarding section "2.4. Weather conditions," the characterization of weather conditions is typically included as part of the "Study area characteristics." Generally, the characterization of an area of study relies on both soil characterization and weather condition characterization. Therefore, the content under "2.4. Weather conditions" should be incorporated within the "Study area characteristics" subsection. Furthermore, it is advisable to move the presentation of soil and weather data from the Materials and Methods section to the Results section. This change will enhance the organization and flow of the manuscript, ensuring that the data and findings are presented in a more appropriate and logical manner. Please make the necessary adjustments to reflect these suggestions and improve the structure and clarity of the manuscript.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 5. Please refrain from beginning sentences with numbers (Line 156).

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 6. ANOVA analysis requires that the quantitative data follow a normal (Gaussian) distribution. In the opposite case, one must proceed to non-parametric tests (the Mann Whitney U test). It's better to specify all the validation conditions before the statistical exploration step the same remark for correlation studies. The normality of the quantitative data must be checked.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The missing information were added to subsection 2.3. Statistical Analysis

Point 7. Ensure that the meaning of abbreviations used in the tables and figures is provided below each respective table or figure.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. If we misunderstood the comments or there are still problems with the manuscript, please let us know and we will make further explains or changes. We hope the revised manuscript could be acceptable for you.

 

Kind regards,

Authors

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Author,

paper entitled “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in natural forest stands in south-western Poland”, deals with a fascinating topic and within the aim of the Journal, but the paper cannot be accepted as the science is not sound. My main concerns are about methods that should be more properly described. For example: the growth stages of the plants at the harvesting dates should be reported and referred to a growth scale to permit reproducibility. My main concerns are about the experimental design and the statistical analysis performed.  No information about the treatments’ allocation was given. How were treatments analyzed? The experimental design is not properly defined, both for field arrangement and for statistical analysis. Repetitions have not been described/reported; this makes the results completely not validated. This vague ANOVA prompted an incorrect/unclear presentation of data: see for example the annotated file: how can table 4 be read? Is this an interaction or only main effects of the treatments have been reported?

Authors should make an overview of their results according to literature and put them into a greater context: what can they state based on their results? Why are their own results interesting? What novelty do they bring to the studied topic? Which can be the different effect of their tested factors (lime and vermicompost)?

Conclusion is only a brief reporting of main results.

English use is not always correct, and some grammatical errors are spread throughout the manuscript. The technical language is poor and as a result, many parts of the paper are difficult to understand.

Other flaws are:

Abstract is unclear

Aim should be better defined.

Define abbreviations at first mention.

Use abbreviations at first mention and then consistently throughout.

Define organisms at first mention.

Tables and figures must be able to stand alone without having to refer to the main text.

 

 

 

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Author,

paper entitled “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in natural forest stands in south-western Poland”, deals with a fascinating topic and within the aim of the Journal, but the paper cannot be accepted as the science is not sound.

 

Point 1. My main concerns are about methods that should be more properly described. For example: the growth stages of the plants at the harvesting dates should be reported and referred to a growth scale to permit reproducibility.

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. The growth stages of the plants at the harvesting dates were defined as full generative development stage (in July) and seed ripening stage (in October), and this information was included into M&M section.

 

Point 2. My main concerns are about the experimental design and the statistical analysis performed.  No information about the treatments’ allocation was given. How were treatments analyzed? The experimental design is not properly defined, both for field arrangement and for statistical analysis. Repetitions have not been described/reported; this makes the results completely not validated. This vague ANOVA prompted an incorrect/unclear presentation of data: see for example the annotated file: how can table 4 be read? Is this an interaction or only main effects of the treatments have been reported?

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. The experimental design and the statistical analysis were presented in subsection 2.3. Statistical Analysis.

 

Point 3. Authors should make an overview of their results according to literature and put them into a greater context: what can they state based on their results? Why are their own results interesting? What novelty do they bring to the studied topic?

Response: Thank you for your comment. All of these issues, we believe, we tried to include in the content of the Discussion chapter.

 

Point 4. Which can be the different effect of their tested factors (lime and vermicompost)?

Response: Thank you for your comment. Sorry, but we assume that this comment does not cover the scope of our work.

 

Point 5. Conclusion is only a brief reporting of main results.

Response: Thank you for your comment. Indeed, the Conclusions are a summary of the results obtained from which there is a clear conclusion that this species can be a valuable source of food components for forest animals during the season, as green fodder, and outside the growing season, as dry biomass.

 

Point 6. English use is not always correct, and some grammatical errors are spread throughout the manuscript. The technical language is poor and as a result, many parts of the paper are difficult to understand.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The English was corrected.

 

Point 7. Other flaws are:

Abstract is unclear

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. Abstract was corrected.

 

Point 8. Aim should be better defined.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The aim of the study has been revised and rewritten.

 

Point 9. Define abbreviations at first mention.

Use abbreviations at first mention and then consistently throughout.

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. The abbreviations at first mention were defined.

 

Point 10. Define organisms at first mention.

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. The organisms at first mention were defined.

 

Point 11. Tables and figures must be able to stand alone without having to refer to the main text.

 

Response: Thank you for your comment. Tables and figures were improved.

 

Responses to comments made directly in the text of the manuscript:

L 17. It was corrected.

L 46. It was corrected.

L 59. Changed the italic font.

L 64. It was corrected.

L 74. Changed the italic font.

L 86. Sentence was corrected.

L 149. It was corrected.

L 156. Changed the italic font.

L 157. Corrected.

L 224. Table 4, the smallest values are marked with the letter "a".

L 227. These values are shown in the figure 3, not in the table.

L 443. This information about plant stages during sampling plant material were also presented in M&M section.

L 510. The effect of year was determined through the influence of pluvio-thermal conditions.

L 562. The “essential nutrient” was changed on “the availability of essential nutrients”.

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. If we misunderstood the comments or there are still problems with the manuscript, please let us know and we will make further explains or changes. We hope the revised manuscript could be acceptable for you.

Kind regards,

Authors

Reviewer 3 Report

 

Review Forests 2510347

July 22, 2023

 

General comments:

 

This is a potentially valuable paper on the nutritional composition of wood melick in a mountainous region of eastern Europe. I read/reviewed the paper as a whole and provided some initial detailed suggestions below, but I kindly suggest that the authors address major issues before moving ahead with a potential publication:

 

1)      The goals of this study were not clearly enough formulated. The authors mention “natural forest habitats,” but how is this reflected in the 10 locations that were chosen? Did they represent different kinds of wildlife (deer) habitat? The graphs are very small in general, but it appears that the 10 locations were all within < 1,500 m of each other. That again raises questions on what the objectives of this study were with respect to habitat quality. In the conclusions the authors compare the nutritional value of this grass to hay, but this has no practical value.

2)      Information about the experimental design are obscure. At the minimum, the author will need to provide information on how the locations were selected and why, how many replications of plant samplings were taken at each location and date, and how those sample locations were spatially related to each other. 

3)      The boxplots are hard to read, even as PDF on screen (impossible as printout) and are confusing to follow. The axis values (scale) is different on each box plots which is not helpful besides that there needs to be a through and detailed figure caption added.

L13: Write rather:... "is not sufficiently recognized..."

 

L46-L48: Do not mix units (g kg-1; %), introduce the abbreviation for dry matter (DM) or any other term at first use.

L59: You may add the common name for Capreolus capreolus (roe deer?), this also needs to be in italics.

L94: I suggest adding substantially more detail here and clearly laying out the objectives for this study in several more sentences.

L98-101: This paragraph should be moved to 2.2. Collection and analysis of plant material

L104-136: I suggest shortening this section. In addition, why is this area important for your study? Why exactly was this area selected for your project?

L138-144: You will need to include much more detail here. Please provide the exact dates you collected the plant material. Equally important, how many samples per location did you take? How large were the areas you took the samples from? How many subsamples did you take?

L146-154: I think this section (soil test results) should be moved to the 3. Results section.

L157: …dried to 70 degree Celsius.

L172-175: There needs to be substantially for detail added to this section. What exactly was the experimental design? How did you choose the 10 locations? In theory, those had to be randomized in some fashion. What were your experimental factors (I presume location and sample date)? If location was a factor, then how many sample replications did you have per location? If you introduce Date of sampling (June and October), then the question of “repeated measures” arises. How did you address that? How did you spatially discern sampling of Melica at each location and date?

L189-202: This entire paragraph can be omitted; the graph will be sufficient.

L205: What exactly is the k-coefficient and why is it important to include it in here?

Table 4:

 

In theory, you should start out with determining interactions between the experimental factors, in your case location and date of sampling. In the case of no interactions, you may move on to presenting location or date effects, if any. Depending on the statistical model you used, there may be year effects as well. You may display averages, but you have to indicate interactions and main effects.

 

 

The quality of English is generally good.

Author Response

Dear Respected Reviewer,

Thank you for your effort involved in preparing the review of our manuscript entitled: “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in natural forest stands in south-western Poland”. We have studied the comments carefully and made the correction in the text of manuscript.

Point 1. The goals of this study were not clearly enough formulated. The authors mention “natural forest habitats,” but how is this reflected in the 10 locations that were chosen? Did they represent different kinds of wildlife (deer) habitat? The graphs are very small in general, but it appears that the 10 locations were all within < 1,500 m of each other. That again raises questions on what the objectives of this study were with respect to habitat quality.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The research was conducted in one habitat, where 10 study sites were selected. They represent one kind of wildlife habitat. This the misstatement has been corrected in the text.

Point 2. In the conclusions the authors compare the nutritional value of this grass to hay, but this has no practical value.

Response: Thank you for your comment. There are very few literature data on the nutritional value of wild forest grasses. Therefore, due to the inability to discuss the results obtained with the results of other studies in this area, we compared the nutritional value of Melica uniflora with the values recorded for cultivated grasses.

Point 3. Information about the experimental design are obscure. At the minimum, the author will need to provide information on how the locations were selected and why, how many replications of plant samplings were taken at each location and date, and how those sample locations were spatially related to each other. 

Response: Thank you for your comment. The indicated deficiencies about the experimental design were suplemented in M&M section.

Point 4. The boxplots are hard to read, even as PDF on screen (impossible as printout) and are confusing to follow. The axis values (scale) is different on each box plots which is not helpful besides that there needs to be a through and detailed figure caption added.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The revised version of the article takes into account the reviewer's comments on the legibility of the figures. In Figures 6a, 6b, 6c, 6d, 13a, 13b, 13c, 13d, the scale of the OX axis was unified. The other figures were not changed due to a clear deterioration in their readability when changed- resulting from too much variation in the content of individual components between harvests.

Point 5. L13: Write rather:... "is not sufficiently recognized..."

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 6. L46-L48: Do not mix units (g kg-1; %), introduce the abbreviation for dry matter (DM) or any other term at first use.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 7. L59: You may add the common name for Capreolus capreolus (roe deer?), this also needs to be in italics.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 8. L94: I suggest adding substantially more detail here and clearly laying out the objectives for this study in several more sentences.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was improved.

Point 9. L98-101: This paragraph should be moved to 2.2. Collection and analysis of plant material

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 10. L104-136: I suggest shortening this section. In addition, why is this area important for your study? Why exactly was this area selected for your project?

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was shortened. This area was selected for the study because there is a lack of such studies regarding this species in this particular area.

Point 11. L138-144: You will need to include much more detail here. Please provide the exact dates you collected the plant material. Equally important, how many samples per location did you take? How large were the areas you took the samples from? How many subsamples did you take?

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done. All meesing information was added to M&M section.

Point 12. L146-154: I think this section (soil test results) should be moved to the 3. Results section.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 13. L157: …dried to 70 degree Celsius.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 14. L172-175: There needs to be substantially for detail added to this section. What exactly was the experimental design? How did you choose the 10 locations? In theory, those had to be randomized in some fashion. What were your experimental factors (I presume location and sample date)? If location was a factor, then how many sample replications did you have per location? If you introduce Date of sampling (June and October), then the question of “repeated measures” arises. How did you address that? How did you spatially discern sampling of Melica at each location and date?

Response: Thank you for your comment. Detailed information was provided in M&M section.of the study in subchapter 2.2. Collection and Analysis of Plant Material.

Point 15. L189-202: This entire paragraph can be omitted; the graph will be sufficient.

Response: Thank you for your comment. In our opinion the description of weather conditions should be left.   

Point 16. L205: What exactly is the k-coefficient and why is it important to include it in here?

Response: Thank you for your comment. The letter “k” was used by mistake. The Selyaninov hydrothermal coefficient (HTC) was used for a detailed assessment of rainfall and temperature in growing seasons (from April to October). The determination of the HTC coefficient allows an indication of how dry or wet the growing season under study is. On this basis, it is possible to infer the influence of weather patterns on, among other things, the nutritional quality of the plants and the impact of the study years.

Point 17. Table 4: In theory, you should start out with determining interactions between the experimental factors, in your case location and date of sampling. In the case of no interactions, you may move on to presenting location or date effects, if any. Depending on the statistical model you used, there may be year effects as well. You may display averages, but you have to indicate interactions and main effects.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The experimental design and the statistical analysis were presented in subsection 2.3. Statistical Analysis.

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. If we misunderstood the comments or there are still problems with the manuscript, please let us know and we will make further explains or changes. We hope the revised manuscript could be acceptable for you.

 

Kind regards,

Authors

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The article has the potential to be accepted for publication

Author Response

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper has been improved.

Can be improved in some places.

Author Response

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. 

Reviewer 3 Report

L176: Please provide a reference for the “marshalling method.”

L184: ….were collected at… (omit *in*)

L185: There is still no information in here on how many test plots you had per location. How far were the 1-m2 plots located from each other at each location?

L209: Dried at 70 degrees C.

L210: You need to introduce DM (dry matter) as an abbreviation here.

L228: If you indicate that you ran a normality test then you need to tell the reader the results.

L276: I still don’t know why you explain the weather in an entire paragraph when the graph is sufficient.

L292: Please explain or reference what the HTC value means.

L329/Table 5: I am still not sure if this table is a proper display of your results. You treat these values here as you wouldn’t have any interactions at all, but you have! For example, for DM, HT interacted with L and Y, so in theory you should evaluate mean differences by holding one factor constant (either Y, L, or HT). I don’t see a problem with displaying averages for the benefit of the reader, but running mean separations on averages simply implies there were no interactions.

L347: You box plots are actually good as this is what you should do if you have interactions. Please indicate that somewhere in the figure caption.

L447: The same applies to this table what was said for Table 5.

L733: I don’t think you provide any data on light interception in your paper.

Author Response

Dear Respected Reviewer,

Thank you for your effort involved in preparing the review of our manuscript entitled: “Nutritional status of wood melick (Melica uniflora Retz.) in natural forest stand in south-western Poland”. We have studied the comments carefully and made the correction in the text of manuscript.

Point 1. L176: Please provide a reference for the “marshalling method.”

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 2.. L184: ….were collected at… (omit *in*)

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 3. L185: There is still no information in here on how many test plots you had per location. How far were the 1-m2 plots located from each other at each location?

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done. All information has been added to the M&M section of the study in subchapter 2.2. Collection and Analysis of Plant Material.

Point 4. L209: Dried at 70 degrees C.

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was corrected.

Point 5. L210: You need to introduce DM (dry matter) as an abbreviation here. 

Response: Thank you for your comment. It was done.

Point 6. L228: If you indicate that you ran a normality test then you need to tell the reader the results.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The following sentence into statistical analyses subsection was introduced: The results allow us to conclude that the distributions of the measured variables do not differ significantly from the normal distribution.

Point 7. L276: I still don’t know why you explain the weather in an entire paragraph when the graph is sufficient.

Response:Thank you for your comment. As suggested, redundant text was removed leaving only the graph.

Point 8. L292: Please explain or reference what the HTC value means.

Response: Thank you for your comment. In the subsection 2.2 Collection and analysis of plant material, we add definition of HTC and in subsection 3.1 Weather conditions, we interpretation of HTC was shown.

Point 9. L329/Table 5: I am still not sure if this table is a proper display of your results. You treat these values here as interactions.you wouldn’t have any interactions at all, but you have! For example, for DM, HT interacted with L and Y, so in theory you should evaluate mean differences by holding one factor constant (either Y, L, or HT). I don’t see a problem with displaying averages for the benefit of the reader, but running mean separations on averages simply implies there were no

Response: Thank you for your comment. The tables presenting the interactions has been added.

Point 10. L347: You box plots are actually good as this is what you should do if you have interactions. Please indicate that somewhere in the figure caption.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The figure captions were corrected.

Point 11. L447: The same applies to this table what was said for Table 5.

Response: Thank you for your comment. The tables presenting the interactions has been added.

Point 12. L733: I don’t think you provide any data on light interception in your paper.

Response: Thank you for your comment. Indeed, we did not measure light interception. However, we have characterized all locations in terms of exposition. In in forest habitats light conditions play more significant role than in other habitats. We assume that exposition influences the amount of light that reaches the plants and influences plant development.

 

We would like to thank you again for taking the time to review our manuscript. If we misunderstood the comments or there are still problems with the manuscript, please let us know and we will make further explains or changes. We hope the revised manuscript could be acceptable for you.

 

Kind regards,

Authors