Processing of Legume Green Manures Slowdowns C Release, Reduces N Losses and Increases N Synchronisation Index for Two Years
, Ausra Arlauskiene 2, Skaidre Suproniene 1, Lina Sarunaite 1, Gabriele Capaite 1 and Zydre Kadziuliene 1Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsMy comments:
1. Article title must be corrected because it is more as statement than an article title.
2. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets [ ].
See requirements.
3. Line 112. Are the coordinates specified correctly? The given coordinates show the building but not the field.
4. Lines 115-117. It must be specified the exact year of the research conduction and the meteorological conditions of that year but not the average data over many years.
It is very important to present the meteorological conditions because it affects the decomposition of organic matter, nitrogen leaching and other processes.
In addition, the organic matter was incorporated at different times, which means that the results may have differed due to different effects of meteorological conditions at the time of sampling.
5. Line 132. Did all the fields grow only winter wheat? Were some of fields winter wheat with red clover?
6.Line 135. As I understand it, winter wheat grew together with red clover in these fields. It is not clear how it was in the other fields (other treatments), was the winter wheat grown with or without red clover? It is very important to specify this.
7. Line 136. It should be indicated how it was incorporated. It is not clear whether plowing or other tillage was applied? It is also unclear whether tillage was applied in the fields of the other treatments after the winter wheat harvest.
7. Line 153. It should be explained how deep the soil was plowed
Was the field plowing depth the same as the mesh bags incorporation depth?
8. Lines 153-154. Are the periods really correct?
9. Line 201. The methodology should describe the fermentation and composting process in detail, as it is not clear why fermented RC has a wider C:N ratio than composted RC with straw.
10. Figures 1-3. It must be explained what these whiskers mean?
11. Table 2. In the International System of Units (SI), the abbreviation "m" stands for meter, which is a measure of length but not time. 6, 12, 18 and 24 months are only valid for RC treatment but not for others. Periods of investigation should be presented correctly.
12. Figure 3. During the periods "I year autumn" and "II year spring", zero values cannot be given for treatments 2-4 (FerRC, ComRC+S and GCM), because organic materials were incorporated only in spring (II year Spring).
13. Figure 4. A line graph is not suitable for representing data. Based on the sampling time specified in the methodology, there could be only one treatment at the first point (I year), 2 treatments at the second (II year), and all 5 treatments at the third (III year). Now we could find intermediate results along the line, but this cannot be done.
14. Figure 4. It is necessary to clearly indicate the time of sampling, because in the methodology is written that "in the spring of each year in every rotation experiment, before cereal sowing" (lines 174-175), in the title of this figure is written "before and after legume green manure incorporation" (lines 266-267) and in Figures is written "I year, II year and III year". In this case, it is not clear how long the green manure was incorporated and what influence it might have had on the amount of nitrogen in the soil.
It should also be remembered that winter wheat is sown in autumn, so it is not appropriate to write "in spring... before cereal sowing".
15. Lines 286-288. At first should be clearly indicate the time of sampling, because in the methodology is written that Nmin "...was measured in the spring of each year in every rotation experiment, before cereal sowing" (lines 174-175), in the title of figure 4. is written "before and after legume green manure incorporation" (lines 266-267) and in Figure 4. is written "I year, II year and III year". In this case, it is not clear how long the green manure was incorporated and what influence it might have had on the amount of nitrogen in the soil.
If Nmin was determined in the first year before sowing of spring wheat or before the incorporation of green manures (FerRC, ComRC+S and GCM) in spring, then these relationships only show a relationship depending on the different amount of Nmin in the soil but not about the use of green manures and their different effectiveness.
Especially in the first years of research to describe the relationship parameters of spring wheat.
16. Lines 297-299. It is unclear how the analysis of correlation was performed. Were the relationship calculated for each treatment separately or between two indicators by calculating the average of the treatments.
If the relationship was not calculated for each treatment separately, then it is not correct to write about legume green manure effect.
17. The list of references is not prepared according to the requirements.
References must be numbered in order of appearance in the text and listed individually at the end of the manuscript. See requirements.
18.The understanding of the article is complicated by the different presentation of research dates, e.g. in the Fig. 2 and 3 "I year autumn; II year spring; II year autumn; III year spring" but in Table 2. "0; 6; 12; 18 and 24 months", in lines 153-154 - "(ii) before ploughing (3 and 6 months respectively), ... (iv) after the harvest (12 and 15 months after fertiliser application)", in the conclusion "... during the first non-growing season (4 months after incorporation) lost 65.6% DM..."
19. Other comments are provided in the article.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
thank you for your valuable comments,
in the pdf file below we are explaining all the changes made to the manuscript.
Sincerely, Monika and a team
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe study is interesting but needs additional work. The authors should improve it. Also, some parts should be checked and revised more carefully.
- The paper's title could be more engaging. Consider adopting a more captivating title.
- In line (34), please expand the abbreviations NUE and BOE to their full names.
- Incorporate any available diagrams or illustrations of the experimental setup or apparatus, if available, into the manuscript.
- Include a flowchart summarizing the proposed methodologies for a clearer overview.
- The phrasing in lines (144-156) is ambiguous. It is recommended to rephrase it for greater clarity for the readers.
- In lines (177-185), it would be beneficial to extract the formulas from the text and present them separately, with a rewrite for enhanced comprehension.
- In line (371-372), please remove the underlining from the sentence.
In my opinion, this paper needs minor revisions before it can be considered complete. Thus, I suggest a minor revision. Thank you.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageMinor editing of English language required
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
thank you for your valuable comments,
in the pdf file below we are explaining all the changes made to the manuscript.
Sincerely, Monika and a team
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsDear Editor and authors, the relevance of the article is average, but I believe that the article can be published after corrections.
In the discussion, authors can improve their writing and make the cause and effect relationship of the treatments tested clearer, below are some suggestions:
- The format of the citations is wrong, see the rules for authors.
- Change the order of the hypothesis and aims, as the hypothesis comes first than the aims.
- How was this in line 120 content humus analysis carried out? – cite the methodology, but if the authors are talking about soil organic matter, they should change the term
- Furthermore, mention the methodologies described for the availability of P and K, because this will determine whether the values are low or high.
- Authors must provide a figure or table with annual temperature and precipitation data during the experimental time per month, and not just the average for the year.
- The methodologies need to be referenced in the material and methods section, as the authors did not invent the methodologies.
- Lines 175 – N-NO3 and NH4 – the spelling is wrong
- Figure 1 does not have a statistical comparison in it, how can readers know when there is a difference? – authors need to reformulate this by inserting such information, the most common is the use of letters to distinguish these differences.
- Figures 2 and 3 follow the same error as Figure 1, but as the letters can make visualization difficult, the authors can inform the minimum significant difference of the test used.
- The quality of the figures must be improved, it is very poor for a scientific article.
- The discussion section is very segmented, and does not establish a continuous relationship of effects, I suggest removing the division of topics and reformulating the discussion in a continuous way.
- The conclusions are long and repetitive compared to the results section, I suggest redoing it, using a maximum of two paragraphs (the ideal is only one), and the authors should focus on answering the objectives proposed in lines 97-104.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
thank you for your valuable comments,
in the pdf file below we are explaining all the changes made to the manuscript.
Sincerely, Monika and a team
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThanks for the effort to correct the article, but I have some more observations. Very nice that you have provided Table 2. Experimental plants, tillage, manuring, litter bags burial and sampling time. This table explains a lot and does not raise any further questions. However, I have a few more comments to improve the article. My comments:
1. Line 50. All abbreviations for the first time, should be explained.
2. Lines 111-127. This presentation of meteorological conditions is better than the previous article, but it would be better to present meteorological conditions for different periods: i. e. from 10/13/2015 to 04/20/2016, further from 04/20/2016 to 10/05/2016; from 10/05/2016 to 04/13/2017 and from 04/13/2017 to 10/10/2017. The organic matter was incorporated at different times, which means that the results may have differed due to different effects of meteorological conditions at the time of sampling.
3. Lines 129-130. It should be indicated name of soil classification or link of literature source, e.g. was the WRB classification used for the soil name description or other? (this previous comment was ignored)
4. Line 144. I thing that winter wheat was sown not 2015 but in autumn of 2014.
5. Lines 144-147. Varietal names are enclosed in neutral single quotes (this previous comment was ignored)
6. Line 177. It is necessary to indicate whether it is a mass of fresh or dry substances.
7. Line 197. The source must be cited and included in the reference list.
8. Lines 264-265. It needs to be explained why, because straw has a wider ratio of nitrogen to carbon (1:70-80). Why composted red clover and straw C:N ratio results is narrower than fermented red clover
9. The name of Figures and Tables needs to be corrected because cattle manure is not a legume green manure
10. Figure 2 and 3. This note (p<0,001) is not informative because it is not clear which treatments have significant differences and which don't
11. Figure 3. During period 13-10-2015 and 20-04-2016 zero values cann't be given for treatments 2-4 (FerRC, ComRC+S and GCM), because organic materials were inserted only in spring (20-04-2016).
12. Subsection 3.4. When analyzing the obtained research data, it was completely forgotten that 1.5 times more nitrogen was incorporated with RC (see Table 3.).
13. Figure 4. It is not clear why it is not marked with letters (see in the figure). If there were no significant differences, it should be marked with the letter "a" everywhere. Does this mean that no statistical analysis was performed on the specified layer?
14. Table 3. Number 1.00 shows not correlational but functional relationships. If there is 1.00, then the correlation is not significant in all cases.
15. Other observations are indicated in the following lines 8, 72, 131, 234, 240, 246, 281, 295, 336, 344-346, 415, 423, 442, 452, 461, 479, 505-508
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
We would like to thank you for being so detailed and clear with requirements and suggestions. The manuscript was deeply improved by the comments of Yours during both rounds.
We add the file with explanantions of the corrections made.
Best regards from our team
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe manuscript can be accpeted.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you very much for your very valuable input to our manuscript and confirmation. Best regards from our team.
