Agri-Food Waste as a Method for Weed Control and Soil Amendment in Crops

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The research work fits the scope of Agronomy with sound scientific bases. 

Author Response

Reviewer #1:

Comments

-English language and style are fine/minor spell check required

Authors. Done. English language was edited.

-The research work fits the scope of Agronomy with sound scientific bases.

Authors. Thank you very much. We appreciate the reviewer’s comment.

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors of the present research have analyzed the use of organic waste as bioherbicides and fertilizers taking into account different seasons. This research is of high interest due to the terrible consequences to the environment and to human and animals health of the use of some chemical compounds commonly used on herbicides and fertilizers. In addition, the employment of waste to be incorporated into these products favor the circular economy and the reduction of environmental pollution due to the bad treatment of some wastes as burn.

I consider that this research is of high interest and the results obtained are a big first step in the incorporation of alternatives ad herbicides and fertilizers. I feel that the introduction and materials and methods sections are well detailed in order to promote the study of this topic by other authors and I consider that the results and discussion sections are well structured and justify it. However, I have some comments to improve the quality before it is published.

-Paragraph 30-38: please delete it. It is about the journal instructions.

-Line 74: 4.15 kg year-1, please include -1 as superscript. In addition, include a dot · between kg and year. This dot is missing from all the text, please review it.

-Line 79 "2892 tonS of broad bean were produced in this country" per year??

-Line 83, 87. Delete "e.g." before references, it is understood that the references will correspond to the previously explained.

-Line 92. Delete respectively after references.

-Line 91. Delete "but see 31". Include only [31].

-Line 104: in vitro and in vivo should be in italic.

-Line 149: delete the space between bulb-edible and crops

-In the main text, the Figure should be expressed as Figure, not as Fig. Modify it in full text

-Figures S1 and S2, please use the foot text to indicate which are expressed in bars and which parameters correspond to each line.

-Please use °C instead of ºC, and modify it in full text.

-Line 209: why 48 hours are used to experiment 2 but only 24h for experiment 1?

-Line 270: Please include the reference to the Kjeldahl method.

-Table 1, S3 and S4. Letters in superscripts

-Foot text for Figure S3 is not in the same format that the rest of the figures. Cyperus should be in italic, etc. Please review it.

-Conclusions. Include future perspectives. Finding a correlation between climate conditions and the effect of herbicides will require at least three years of study. The authors pretend to repeat all of them, focusing just on the best results…?

-References are not in journal format. Please review them according to the instructions for the authors: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/agronomy/instructions#references

Author Response

 

Reviewer #2: The authors of the present research have analyzed the use of organic waste as bioherbicides and fertilizers taking into account different seasons. This research is of high interest due to the terrible consequences to the environment and to human and animals health of the use of some chemical compounds commonly used on herbicides and fertilizers. In addition, the employment of waste to be incorporated into these products favor the circular economy and the reduction of environmental pollution due to the bad treatment of some wastes as burn.

I consider that this research is of high interest and the results obtained are a big first step in the incorporation of alternatives ad herbicides and fertilizers. I feel that the introduction and materials and methods sections are well detailed in order to promote the study of this topic by other authors and I consider that the results and discussion sections are well structured and justify it. However, I have some comments to improve the quality before it is published.

Authors. Thank you very much. We appreciate all these comments.

 

Comments

-English language and style are fine/minor spell check required

Authors. Done. English language was edited.

-Paragraph 30-38: please delete it. It is about the journal instructions.

Authors. Done.

-Line 74: 4.15 kg year-1, please include -1 as superscript. In addition, include a dot · between kg and year. This dot is missing from all the text, please review it.

Authors. Done. The unit kg year^-1 appears once throughout the text and we included a dot between kg and year^-1 as indicated by the reviewer, line 140. Therefore, we do not understand very well what missing dots are the reviewer referring to. Does the reviewer mean that dots should be included between units such as Mg ha^-1, L ha^-1, mg kg^-1, etc., which appear in the text? In this case, this format seems to be valid, since it appears in published articles in Agronomy. For example, Agronomy 2021, 11(10), 1970, https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11101970; Agronomy 2022, 12, 978. https://doi.org/10.3390/ agronomy12040978.

However, if this format is not correct, we will change it throughout the text. Please, can the reviewer clarify this issue?

-Line 79 "2892 tonS of broad bean were produced in this country" per year??

Authors. Done. The sentence has been changed and now it reads: “… 2892 tons of broad bean were produced in this country that year,…”, line 145.

-Line 83, 87. Delete "e.g." before references, it is understood that the references will correspond to the previously explained.

Authors. Done.

-Line 92. Delete respectively after references.

Authors. Done.

-Line 91. Delete "but see 31". Include only [31].

Authors. Done.

-Line 104: in vitro and in vivo should be in italic.

Authors. Done.

-Line 149: delete the space between bulb-edible and crops

Authors. Done.

-In the main text, the Figure should be expressed as Figure, not as Fig. Modify it in full text

Authors. Done. “Fig.” was changed by “Figure” thorough the text.

-Figures S1 and S2, please use the foot text to indicate which are expressed in bars and which parameters correspond to each line.

Authors. Done. The information was added as required by the reviewer. Now it reads: “Figure S1. Meteorological data registered during pot experiments in Spring-Summer (A, experiment 1) and Autumn (B, experiment 2) 2019. Start = beginning of the experiment, End = End of the experiment. Blue Bars represent rainfall (mm); green line represents relative humidity (%); orange line represents average temperature (°C).” and “Figure S2. Meteorological data registered during field experiments in Spring-Summer (A, experiment 3) and Autumn (B, experiment 4) 2020. Start = beginning of the experiment, End = End of the experiment.  Blue Bars represent rainfall (mm); green line represents relative humidity (%); orange line represents average temperature (°C).” Supplementary material.

-Please use °C instead of ºC, and modify it in full text.

Authors. Done. “ºC” was changed by “°C” thorough the text.

-Line 209: why 48 hours are used to experiment 2 but only 24h for experiment 1?

Authors. Done. In experiment 1, rain occurred on June 6^th (24 h, Figure S1). However, in experiment 2, rain occurred from October 17^th to October 19^th (48 h, Figure S2). This information was added to the text to improve text clarity and now it reads: “After treatments application, pots were covered by plastic bags for 24 h to avoid premature treatments leachate by rain on June 6^th (Figure S1).” Lines 507-508, and “At the beginning of the experiment, pots were covered by plastic bags for 48 h to avoid premature treatments leachate by rain from October 17^th to October 19^th (Figure S1)” lines 573-575.

-Line 270: Please include the reference to the Kjeldahl method.

Authors. Done. The reference was added to lines 588 and 682.

-Table 1, S3 and S4. Letters in superscripts

Authors. Done. Statistical letters in Tables 1, 2, S3 and S4 were marked as superscripts.

-Foot text for Figure S3 is not in the same format that the rest of the figures. Cyperus should be in italic, etc. Please review it.

Authors. Done. Figure legend for Figure S3 was formatted as the rest of figures and Cyperus and Vicia faba were italicized.

-Conclusions. Include future perspectives. Finding a correlation between climate conditions and the effect of herbicides will require at least three years of study. The authors pretend to repeat all of them, focusing just on the best results…?

Authors. Done. We included future perspectives at the Conclusions section and now it reads: “To find new alternatives to control weeds is a major task for the future of organic agriculture, as well as for environmental and human health preservation. Various organic waste can play an important role replacing synthetic pesticides, reason why we assessed the role of Urtica dioica waste, Vicia faba pods, spent coffee grounds, and corn cobs waste.

The findings of this study show that, among all the evaluated waste, the application of CG at 9 Mg ha^-1 reduced biomass of total naturally-emerged weeds while stimulated crop growth, under scarce rainfall and warm days. The inhibitory effect is probably to occur between weeks three and four, after incorporation of this waste into the soil. The inhibitory and stimulating effects of CG obtained under real conditions suggest that this waste could partially replace the use of synthetic agrochemicals and provide new evidence to boost Circular Economy. However, the effectiveness of this waste seems to be limited by environmental conditions and probably by the applied dose. Despite these promising results, additional field research is required to corroborate the obtained effect of CG at different doses in the long term, covering several years.” Lines 1148-1161.

 

-References are not in journal format. Please review them according to the instructions for the authors: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/agronomy/instructions#references Authors. Done. References were formatted according to journal instructions. In the reference list, I accepted all tracked changes to improve text clarity.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The manuscript treats about Agri-food waste as a method for weed control and soil amendment in crops. According to EU and Green Deal Regulations, the ammount of chemical hirbicides will be decreasing, increasing the same alternative and natural cvompounds. The research idea directly is according to New Deal rules, but the research plan is poor and should be deeply revised.

1. In the Introduction I do not understand the statement of 30 - 38 lines
2. Please do not write personally (we did)
3. I do not understand Material and Methods Section. There are so may species tested and it looks messy for me
4. Please describe statistical method
5. Please try to makr the results in order. It is so messy.
6. Please try to make a couple of strong concusions that could support your results
7. The figures of the results look unclear
8. The discussion should be revised
9. English should be deply revised.

 

Author Response

Reviewer #3:

 

 

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript treats about Agri-food waste as a method for weed control and soil amendment in crops. According to EU and Green Deal Regulations, the ammount of chemical hirbicides will be decreasing, increasing the same alternative and natural cvompounds. The research idea directly is according to New Deal rules, but the research plan is poor and should be deeply revised.

Authors. Thank you. We appreciate the reviewer’s comments. However, we were unable to infer what the reviewer means when he writes “the research plan is poor and should be deeply revised.”

1. In the Introduction I do not understand the statement of 30 - 38 lines

Authors. It was a mistake. It corresponds to journal instructions, and it has already been deleted.

2. Please do not write personally (we did)

Authors. Done. English language was reviewed.

3. I do not understand Material and Methods Section. There are so may species tested and it looks messy for me
4. Please describe statistical method
5. Please try to makr the results in order. It is so messy.
6. Please try to make a couple of strong concusions that could support your results
7. The figures of the results look unclear
8. The discussion should be revised
9. English should be deply revised.

 

Authors. We do not understand very well the reviewer 3 regarding points 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8. Comments are very general without specifying issues that should be addressed, making it difficult to take them into account. On the other hand, these comments are different and opposite from those of reviewer 1 and 2, who positively reviewed our work and did not find any problematic issue pointed out by reviewer 3. In addition, reviewer 3 indicated that “Please describe statistical method”, which we consider that is not applicable at all since statistical methods are clearly described in section 2.6 “Statistical analyses”, lines 726-811.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

I do insist with my previous comments to the manuscript.

Author Response

Reviewer #3:

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 I do insist with my previous comments to the manuscript

Reviewer’s comments in R1

- I do not understand Material and Methods Section. There are so may species tested and it looks messy for me

Authors. Several crop species were selected to assess the waste effect on different crops, ensuring different taxa and crop-edible plant parts. Lactuca sativa L. and Raphanus sativus var. niger (Mill.) J.Kern. were chosen to represent leaf-edible and bulb-edible crops under Spring-summer conditions, while Brassica rapa subsp. nipposinica (L. H. Bailey) Hanelt (leaf-edible) and Beta vulgaris L., Sp. Pl. (bulb-edible) were chosen to represent crops under Autumn conditions.

This information is already present in section 2.3

- Please describe statistical method

Authors. The statistical method is already described in detail in section 2.6.

- Please try to makr the results in order. It is so messy.

Authors. Results are described in order, following the same order as in Material and Methods section, that is: experiment 1 (pot Spring-Summer), then Experiment 2 (pot Autumn), then Experiment 3 (field Spring-Summer) and then Experiment 4 (field Autumn).

- Please try to make a couple of strong concusions that could support your results

Authors. Two new conclusions have been already added in the previous version of the revised manuscript.

-  The figures of the results look unclear

Authors. We do not understand the Reviewer’s comment. Figures are clear to us as well as to Reviewers 1 and 2. Please, can you indicate how we must improve the figures?

-  The discussion should be revised

Authors. We do not understand the Reviewer’s comment. Discussion is clear to us and to the Reviewers1 and 2. Please, can you indicate how we must improve the Discussion?

 Authors. The other remaining comments were already addressed in Round 1.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx