Effect of Irrigation Schedule and Organic Fertilizer on Wheat Yield, Nutrient Uptake, and Soil Moisture in Northwest India
, Malu Ram Yadav 2,*, Satya Narayan Meena 3, Hanuman Singh Jatav 2,*, Milan Kumar Lal 4, Vishnu D. Rajput 5 and Tatiana Minkina 5Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Overall:
This is a study of the effects of irrigation scheduling and fertilizer/manure applications on wheat yield. Although the premise of the study and the results could have an important impact on achieving greater efficiency in water use and soil health, it is difficult to evaluate the validity of the reported results due to missing or poorly described information in the Materials and Methods.
Abstract:
Contains many undefined acronyms, which makes it confusing and difficult to understand the meaning.
Introduction:
Incomplete sentences (also throughout the manuscript)
Contains many undefined acronyms, which makes it confusing and difficult to understand the meaning.
Lines 42-43: “Wheat production is further impacted by crop housing, unblanched fertilization, nutrition extraction and water constraint.” What do you mean by “crop housing”? Should “unblanched fertilization” be changed to “unbalanced fertilization”?
Line 58: What are “fake chemical fertilizers”?
Materials and Methods:
Line 101: “Farmyard manure (FYM)” This definition of the FYM acronym should occur much earlier in the paper.
Lines 109-110: “cumulative pan evaporation (CPE)” This definition should occur much earlier in the paper.
The control M0 for the manure treatment comparisons is never described. Were no nutrients applied? Were chemical fertilizers applied? This is such a critical aspect to your study, because the results of your treatments only have meaning in the context of your control. This oversight makes it difficult to evaluate the validity of your data.
Lines 151-158: “It appears that you are outlining a technique for estimating soil moisture loss from various depths in root zone. The area of soil where plant roots are actively growing and absorbing moisture is known as the root zone. You have divided the root zone into four levels according to depth, namely 0-15, 15-30, 30-45 and 45-60 cm. The soil moisture depletion will be assessed using these layers. The quantity of moisture that is removed from each layer for a brief period of time (such as a day or a week) is calculate and the short-term depletion values for each layer are added up over the course of the full growing season until crop maturity.”
The above paragraph reads like instructions to a technician or student. Does this paragraph belong in the paper?
Lines 178-184: You need a more comprehensive description of your statistical analysis.
Results:
Lines 197-200: This is the first time 1/3 bar is mentioned. This should be explained in the Materials and Methods section.
How did you report your data from two years of data collection? Were the data pooled? Did you use repeated measures analysis?
Table 2: At what depth are you measuring moisture content for the data reported in this table?
“Figures A2 and A3. Show how organic manures and irrigation schedule affect how much NPK wheat grains absorb.” This figure appears to show the relationship between wheat yield and nutrient uptake. I don’t see irrigation schedule or organic manures reflected at all.
Table 4: Do plants take up P205 and K20 or do they actually take up these nutrients in their ionic forms? What did you actually measure?
Table 6: Shouldn’t the title of this table be, “Influence of irrigation timing and organic manure usage on soil moisture depletion at different depths”?
The difficulty in reading this manuscript was a combination of English language issues and poor grammar and sentence construction. Once the English language issues are resolved, I recommend someone with good editing skills correct the grammar issues as well.
Author Response
Response to the Reviewer #1
This is a study of the effects of irrigation scheduling and fertilizer/manure applications on wheat yield. Although the premise of the study and the results could have an important impact on achieving greater efficiency in water use and soil health, it is difficult to evaluate the validity of the reported results due to missing or poorly described information in the Materials and Methods:
Response: Necessary explanations and modifications have been incorpoted in the text of above topic. Kindly refer: Line No 82; 95; 107-117; 119; 136-137; 142; 144-146; 152-155; 163; 168; 177-180.
Abstract: Contains many undefined acronyms, which makes it confusing and difficult to understand the meaning
Response: Acronyms like FYM, Sem+, CD and Mg ha-1 have been defined and well explained to understand their meaning. Kindly refer: Line No 29-30; 119; 177-180.
Introduction: Incomplete sentences (also throughout the manuscript). Contains many undefined acronyms, which makes it confusing and difficult to understand the meaning.
Response: Incomple sentances throughout the manuscript if any, have been completed and improved. Kindly refer: Line No 43; 53-58; 62-63; 65; 71; 77-78.
Line 42-43: Wheat production is further impacted by crop housing, unblanched fertilization, nutrition extraction and water constraint.” What do you mean by “crop housing”? Should “unblanched fertilization” be changed to “unbalanced fertilization”?
Response: Crop housing replaced by crop management and unbalanced fertilization changed to imbalanced fertilization. Kindly refer: Line No 43.
Line 58: What are “fake chemical fertilizers”?
Response: Fake removed from chemical fertilizers. Kindly refer: Line No 62.
Line 101: “Farmyard manure (FYM)” This definition of the FYM acronym should occur much earlier in the paper.
Response: Explain in materials and methods. Kindly refer: Line No 71.
Line 109-110: cumulative pan evaporation (CPE)” This definition should occur much earlier in the paper.
Response: Explain in materials and methods. Kindly refer: Line No 107-117.
The control M0 for the manure treatment comparisons is never described. Were no nutrients applied? Were chemical fertilizers applied?.
Response: Yes, Maintain nutrient through recommended dose of phosphorus @ 30 kg/ha through diammonium phosphate (DAP) and 90 kg nitrogen through urea were applied in whole experiment plot as well as in control plot. Kindly refer: Line No. 99-100.
Lines 151-158: “It appears that you are outlining a technique for estimating soil moisture loss from various depths in root zone. The area of soil where plant roots are actively growing and absorbing moisture is known as the root zone. You have divided the root zone into four levels according to depth, namely 0-15, 15-30, 30-45 and 45-60 cm. The soil moisture depletion will be assessed using these layers. The quantity of moisture that is removed from each layer for a brief period of time (such as a day or a week) is calculate and the short-term depletion values for each layer are added up over the course of the full growing season until crop maturity.” The above paragraph reads like instructions to a technician or student. Does this paragraph belong in the paper?
Response: The above paragraph has been modified/deleted as per need. Kindly refer: Line No. 133-155.
Lines 178-184: You need a more comprehensive description of your statistical analysis.
Response: Already explaind in comprehensive manner. Kindly refer: Line No 174-177.
Lines 197-200: This is the first time 1/3 bar is mentioned. This should be explained in the Materials and Methods section.
Response: The above paragraph has been explained. Kindly refer: Line No 133-137.
How did you report your data from two years of data collection? Were the data pooled? Did you use repeated measures analysis?
Response: Yes, results of 2 years experimentation were pooled and described. Kindly refer: Line No 82-83.
Table 2: At what depth are you measuring moisture content for the data reported in this table?
Response: At each 15 cm depth. Kindly refer: Line No 152-157.
“Figures A2 and A3. Show how organic manures and irrigation schedule affect how much NPK wheat grains absorb.” This figure appears to show the relationship between wheat yield and nutrient uptake. I don’t see irrigation schedule or organic manures reflected at all.
Response: Revised. Kindly refer: Line No 218-219.
Table 4: Do plants take up P205 and K20 or do they actually take up these nutrients in their ionic forms? What did you actually measure?
Response: We have estimated total uptake of N, P and K not P2O5 and K2O and revised. Kindly refer: Line No 221.
Table 6: Shouldn’t the title of this table be, “Influence of irrigation timing and organic manure usage on soil moisture depletion at different depths”?
Response: Yes, title of this table has been revised as per suggestion. Kindly refer: Line No 253-254.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The approached topic is of great importance for both researchers and agricultural practice. I appreciate the manuscript structure which makes it clear and easy to follow.
The Results are clearly presented in tables and figures.
The Discussions are detailed, exhaustive, and well-backed by references.
I also appreciate the many, fairly recent, and well-cited references.
I suggest some improvements as follows:
Explain acronyms when they first occur in the text (IW/CPE ratio; FYM).
Explain the meaning of "fake chemical fertilizers".
Revise the phrase in rows 106-108, it seems incomplete.
Present the computation for the amount of water used for irrigation.
Explain "Mg·ha-1"?
Present how the quantity of moisture that is removed from each layer for a brief period of time is calculated. Explain „moisture depletion” and its relevance for crop development.
Describe the operating principle of the USWB Class and present the calculating formula.
Add some comments on NPK contents of the seed and straw, as in whether they reflect a good and balanced nutrition, the values range in the normal contents’ intervals (or not; and give reference for those intervals or compare to other values cited by literature).
Add a citation to the statement in row 214.
I would advise against using expressions like "may" or "may be" as they induce uncertainty, in my opinion. Use a resolute expression instead, the more so as the discussions are backed by references.
Revise the first reference as it seems to be incomplete.
Some language and typing corrections are needed. For instance, in row 62, instead of groundwater pollution (I suppose) appears groundwater population which confuses readers.
Verbs are sometimes used in a faulty form, such as in row 57 where is is wrongfully added to also plays.
There are other such instances that in my opinion diminish the readability of an otherwise interesting paper.
Author Response
Response to the Reviewer #2
The Results are clearly presented in tables and figures, The Discussions are detailed, exhaustive, and well-backed by references,
Response: All Authors senciarly Thank the esteemed reviewer for providing positive comments towards improvement of our manuscript. It will definatly encourage us in future research
Explain acronyms when they first occur in the text (IW/CPE ratio; FYM):
Response: IW/CPE= Depth of irrigation/comulative pan evaporation ratio
FYM= Farm Yard Manure
Already explained in the text. Kindly refer: Line No 25; 29; 70.
Explain the meaning of "fake chemical fertilizers":
Response: In place of fake chemical fertilizers, chemical fertilizer written. Kindly refer: Line No 62.
Revise the phrase in rows 106-108, it seems incomplete:
Response: Phrase in row 106-108, has been completed. Kindly refer: Line No 106-117.
Present the computation for the amount of water used for irrigation:
Response: 45 cm at each irrigation at fixed ratio. Kindly refer: Line No 113-114.
Explain "Mg·ha-1"?:
Response: Mg ha-1 already explained in the text at appropriate place. Kindly refer: Line No 119.
Present how the quantity of moisture that is removed from each layer for a brief period of time is calculated. Explain„ moisture depletion” and its relevance for crop development:
Response: How fast moisture is depleting from different layers and extent of depletion. Kindly refer: Line No 152-157.
Describe the operating principle of the USWB Class and present the calculating formula:
Response: About USWB class A open pan evaporimeter, the matter included as per the requirement. Kindly refer: Line No 109-117.
Add some comments on NPK contents of the seed and straw, as in whether they reflect a good and balanced nutrition, the values range in the normal contents’ intervals (or not; and give reference for those intervals or compare to other values cited by literature):
Add a citation to the statement in row 214:
Response: Statement in row 214 has been corrected. Kindly refer: Line No 204.
I would advise against using expressions like "may" or "may be" as they induce uncertainty, in my opinion. Use a resolute expression instead, the more so as the discussions are backed by references:
Response: Words ‘may ’ or ‘may be‘ deleted from discussion chapter. Kindly refer: Line No 263; 294; 356-357.
Revise the first reference as it seems to be incomplete:
Response: First reference revised. Kindly refer: Line No 373-376.
Some language and typing corrections are needed. For instance, in row 62, instead of groundwater pollution (I suppose) appears groundwater population which confuses readers:
Response: In row 62 and throughout the manuscript corrections of language or otherwise have been done like ground water pollution instead of population. Kindly refer: Line No 65.
Verbs are sometimes used in a faulty form, such as in row 57 where is is wrongfully added to also plays:
Response: In row 57 correction made. Kindly refer: Line No 53-58.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The peer-reviewed paper addresses the important aspect of the use of organic fertilisers and irrigation for sustainable wheat crop production. In my opinion, the paper fits the nature of the journal Sustainability but the following corrections should be made before publication:
1. I suggest changing the topic to: "Effect of irrigation schedule and organic fertiliser on wheat yield, nutrient uptake and soil moisture in north-west India".
The previous one is not clear enough for me
2. there should be no abbreviations in the abstract - they are unclear to the reader
3. line 146 - the formula should have a number on the right hand side (also, in the formula a small "w" and in the description a large one)
4. line 151: sentence:
"It appears that you are outlining a technique for estimating soil moisture loss from various depths in root zone."
Seems redundant at this point in the manusrcipt
5. line 169 - only the opening parenthesis present.
6. lines 179-180 I propose instead of :
The F-test with a 5% probability level was used to compare significant differences between treatments through the critical difference [17].
To write:
The F-test with a 5% probability level was used to indicate significant differences between treatments [17].
7. line 183 : you write : principal component analysis were performer. What did you use this analysis for and where are the results, if any? I do not find information on this in the manuscript text
8. table 2 (and others) the designations "SEm ± "and "CD" appear - these are not previously explained
9 Line 196 - Figure A1. A clearer picture would be a graph showing how the average wheat yield changed for each combination of fertiliser schedule and organic fertiliser.
10. was the interaction not interesting from the point of view of the experimenter? I do not see any reference in the study.
11. row 211 - Table 3 (similarly Table 4, 5) - if statistically significant differences are found, it is recommended to introduce letter designations, in order to easily see which treatments do not significantly affect the traits under study.
Author Response
Response to the Reviewer #3
I suggest changing the topic to: "Effect of irrigation schedule and organic fertiliser on wheat yield, nutrient uptake and soil moisture in north-west India".The previous one is not clear enough for me:
Response: Topic has been changed as suggested. Kindly refer: Line No 2-3.
There should be no abbreviations in the abstract - they are unclear to the reader:
Response: Abbreviations in the asbstract changed to their full form. Kindly refer: Line No 25; 29.
line 146 - the formula should have a number on the right hand side (also, in the formula a small "w" and in the description a large one):
Response: The formula has been corrected as per suggestion. Kindly refer: Line No 146.
line 151: sentence: "It appears that you are outlining a technique for estimating soil moisture loss from various depths in root zone." Seems redundant at this point in the manusrcipt:
Response: Ststement deleted. Kindly refer: Line No 151-156.
line 169 - only the opening parenthesis present:
Response: Paranthesis has been put at closing. Kindly refer: Line No 168.
- lines 179-180 I propose instead of :
The F-test with a 5% probability level was used to compare significant differences between treatments through the critical difference [17]:
To write:
The F-test with a 5% probability level was used to indicate significant differences between treatments [17].
Response: Line 179-180 has been corrected as suggested. Kindly refer: Line No 177-180.
line 183 : you write : principal component analysis were performer. What did you use this analysis for and where are the results, if any? I do not find information on this in the manuscript text:
Response: Reviewers observation is right and modified accordingly. Kindly refer: Line No 177-180.
table 2 (and others) the designations "SEm ± "and "CD" appear - these are not previously explained:
Response: SEm ± "and "CD explained in materials and methods. Kindly refer: Line No 177-178.
Line 196 - Figure A1. A clearer picture would be a graph showing how the average wheat yield changed for each combination of fertiliser schedule and organic fertiliser:
Response: Bar diagram also indicate good picture of increasing and decreasing of yield due to treatments. Kindly refer: Line No 190.
Was the interaction not interesting from the point of view of the experimenter? I do not see any reference in the study:
Response: No interaction was found to be significant in the experiment.
Row 211 - Table 3 (similarly Table 4, 5) - if statistically significant differences are found, it is recommended to introduce letter designations, in order to easily see which treatments do not significantly affect the traits under study:
Response: Table 3, suggested correction incorpoted. Kindly refer: Line No 204-205.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Overall:
This is a study of the effects of irrigation scheduling and fertilizer/manure applications on wheat yield. Although the premise of the study and the results could have an important impact on achieving greater efficiency in water use and soil health, it remains difficult to evaluate the validity of the reported results due to only vague description of statistical analysis and no explanation of the control treatment. Without knowing the details of your control treatment, I cannot evaluate the significance of your results, and your results are not reproducible.
Lines 65-66: “Yet, over use of chemical fertilizers has reduced crop yields,
reduced soil fertility, increased greenhouse gas emissions and decreased groundwater pollution.” - Do you mean increased groundwater pollution?
Lines 100-101: “When planting, apply sufficient amount of phosphorus
and half the amount of nitrogen as base fertilizer and cover twice the amount of remaining nitrogen.” – This is vague and confusing. Is this a description of your fertilization regime at the time of planting? What is a “sufficient amount of phosphorus” based on? Soil testing?
Line 110: Do you mean “standard procedure”?
Table 1: You still have not defined your organic manures “control” treatment (M0). A control can be no treatment, or a standard treatment whose effect is already known, for example. This is needed to allow the researcher to minimize the effects of factors other than the one being tested. It eliminates the possibility that the observed results are not just random events.
Line 138: “studyinzfg” - Check for keyboarding errors.
Line 144: “the moisture percentage using the following formula was calculated” – Should be: “the moisture percentage was calculated using the following formula”
Lines 175-179: The description of your statistical analysis is vague, at best. What method did you use to analyze two years of data? Mixed methods analysis? Repeated measures? Did you perform statistical analysis by hand? Or did you use a statistical software package?
Although I have noted improvements in use of the English language, there remain instances where the noun/verb order were reversed and minor misspelling of words.
Author Response
Response to the Reviewer #1 (Round-2)
This is a study of the effects of irrigation scheduling and fertilizer/manure applications on wheat yield. Although the premise of the study and the results could have an important impact on achieving greater efficiency in water use and soil health, it remains difficult to evaluate the validity of the reported results due to only vague description of statistical analysis and no explanation of the control treatment. Without knowing the details of your control treatment, I cannot evaluate the significance of your results, and your results are not reproducible.:
Response: Generally, irrigation is applied at 0.9 IW/CPE ratio throughout the crop period irrespective of growth stage. This treatment may be considered at control base treatment to compare other treatments (schedules of irrigation), whereas, irrigation is applied at different ratio and growth stages to estimate saving of irrigation, if any.
Lines 65-66: “Yet, over use of chemical fertilizers has reduced crop yields, reduced soil fertility, increased greenhouse gas emissions and decreased groundwater pollution.” - Do you mean increased groundwater pollution?
Response: This may be considered as adverse effect of exceesive use of chemical fertilizer on soil and ground water.
Lines 100-101: “When planting, apply sufficient amount of phosphorus and half the amount of nitrogen as base fertilizer and cover twice the amount of remaining nitrogen.” – This is vague and confusing. Is this a description of your fertilization regime at the time of planting? What is a “sufficient amount of phosphorus” based on? Soil testing?
Response: Uder exiting soil condition nitrogen is applied three split to avoid the leaching losses with irrigation water. Phosphorus was applied through critical limit (soil testing bases).
Line 110: Do you mean “standard procedure”?
Response: Because USBW A pan evarimeter directly measure the daily evaporation which is converted into crop evaporation multiplying by crop factor (average 0.8).
Table 1: You still have not defined your organic manures “control” treatment (M0). A control can be no treatment, or a standard treatment whose effect is already known, for example. This is needed to allow the researcher to minimize the effects of factors other than the one being tested. It eliminates the possibility that the observed results are not just random events.
Response: Common dose of fertilizer was applied as per recommended but treatment (M0) no manure was applied.
Line 138: “studyinzfg” - Check for keyboarding errors.
Response: studyinzfg is typing mistak and it was corrected as a stduying. Kindly refer: Line No 138.
Line 144: “the moisture percentage using the following formula was calculated” – Should be: “the moisture percentage was calculated using the following formula”
Response: Corrected as menation your demand. Line No. 144.
Lines 175-179: The description of your statistical analysis is vague, at best. What method did you use to analyze two years of data? Mixed methods analysis? Repeated measures? Did you perform statistical analysis by hand? Or did you use a statistical software package?
Response: The above paragraph has been explainedand modified. Kindly refer: Line No. 179-183.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 3
Reviewer 1 Report
Thank you for explaining your control treatment for manure. It would be clearer for the reader if you would also include that explanation in your Materials and Methods section.
Needs minor editing
Author Response
Thank you for explaining your control treatment for manure. It would be clearer for the reader if you would also include that explanation in your Materials and Methods section.:
Response: Explained of control treatment for irrigation schedule and organic manure manure in Materials and Methods section. . Line No. 115-120.
Comment Quality of English is required minor editing?
Response: Quality of English edituing was improved in the whole manuscript.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
