Hydraulic Trait Variation with Tree Height Affects Fruit Quality of Walnut Trees under Drought Stress
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Although experiments seems a generalised drought stress study, but experimental planning has made it some novel, their for manuscript should be considered for publication after further improvements.
Abstract needs more English refinement and some data should be included.
Introduction needs much English improvment, italized the words as and when required, additionally add some recent reference, and significance of the study.
In materials and method section experiemntal planning should be written more properly.
In result section i have found authors assigned letter of significant in some picture but not in some, made it more uniform.
Major concern regarding pictures are how letter asigned are same but the data are very much different for different bars, please check once and if possible could authors provide triplicate data for revision.
Discussion is written well with proper supporting references, but it requires extensive English improvement.
Over all manuscript can be considered after minor revision
Author Response
Dear reviewer:
We have carefully revised the manuscript (Manuscript ID: agronomy-1799992) according to your comments, the detailed responses to the comments are listed below point-by-point, with original comments in black and our responses in blue. We would like to thank the anonymous reviewer for his or her kind comments and valuable suggestions. To ensure the quality of the revised version, we invited a professional editor to have a thorough check on the manuscript. If there are any questions in the article that need further revision, we are willing to improve it. We look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you very much for your favorable consideration on our MS.
Following are the reviewer’s comments and our response to the comments:
Reviewer: 1
Comments to the Author
Although experiments seems a generalised drought stress study, but experimental planning has made it some novel, their for manuscript should be considered for publication after further improvements.
Reply: We are very grateful to the constructive comments which are very helpful in improving the quality of this MS. According to your minor comments we have refined and revised the abstract, introduction and discussion part. We also invited a professional editor to have a thorough check on the manuscript.
Major comments:
(1) Abstract needs more English refinement and some data should be included.
Reply: Thank you for your constructive suggestion. We refined the abstract and included more data (P. 1-2, in track changed MS).
(2) Introduction needs much English improvment, italized the words as and when required, additionally add some recent reference, and significance of the study.
Reply: Thanks. We improved English in the introduction section according to your opinion! We checked and corrected italics and Latin throughout the article. We also added some recent reference and point out the significance of the study. We are confident that the quality and readability of our paper have improved based on your comments (P. 2-3 in track changed MS).
(3) In materials and method section experiemntal planning should be written more properly.
Reply: Thanks. We have detailed the materials and methods section to address your concerns (P. 3-5 in track changed MS).
(4) In result section i have found authors assigned letter of significant in some picture but not in some, made it more uniform.
Reply: Many thanks for pointing out the shortcomings of the articles. We checked the significance of all the graphs in the article to avoid mistakes. Graphs without marked letters are because there are no significant differences among the treatment or tree height. We use N.S, to indicate that there is no statistical difference. It is particularly important to note that Figure 6d have no replicates. As we had explained in the article, logistical feasibility precluded our ability to investigate more trees because labor intensive to manually broke the shell of walnut for many trees.
(5) Major concern regarding pictures are how letter asigned are same but the data are very much different for different bars, please check once and if possible could authors provide triplicate data for revision.
Reply: Many thanks to the reviewer for their constructive comments. We tested for the significant differences once more with one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) using the statistical software SPSS 16.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA). Figure 1, 2 and 5 have been replaced. We hope this work can improve the presentation quality. If there need further revision, we are willing to improve it.
(6) Discussion is written well with proper supporting references, but it requires extensive English improvement.
Reply: Thanks. We edited the language in the discussion part to make it perfect (P. 15-16 in track changed MS).
(7) Over all manuscript can be considered after minor revision
Reply: We are grateful to the reviewer for their constructive comments and approval of the article for publication after minor revisions.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors presented a manuscript entitled “Hydraulic trait variation with tree height affects fruit quality of walnut trees under drought stress”. This article reports on the effects of different irrigation treatments and tree height on the physiology, growth and fruit quality of common walnut (Juglans regia L.) as the target species. The language quality is good.
In my opinion, elucidation of the influence of variation in hydraulic architecture with increasing tree height on fruit quality within the canopy, especially under drought stress, is very important to breeding of cultivated fruit trees. However, due to some technical deficiencies in the manuscript, I recommend “minor revision”
Minor comments:
a) Lines 210-211: Change “Using” into “We used” Origin 9.0 software to process relevant charts (Origin Lab Corp., Northampton, MA, USA)”.
b) It has been reported that “soil water potential at 0-90 cm was 0.73 MPa in the EI group, 0.42 MPa in the CI group, and 0.18 MPa in the DI group”. Accordingly, in Figure 1, please reconsider switching places of the graphic columns, error bars and letters for DI and EI treatments.
c) Trend in lettering is “A” i.e. “a” for the highest values. Hence, reconsider lettering for the Figure 1 and Figure 2a. Error bars and letters are missing in Figure 6d.
d) The Conclusions section is too taxatively written, please revise it and emphasize the scientific contribution of the presented work.
Author Response
Dear reviewer:
We have carefully revised the manuscript (Manuscript ID: agronomy-1799992) according to your comments, the detailed responses to the comments are listed below point-by-point, with original comments in black and our responses in blue. We would like to thank the anonymous reviewer for his or her kind comments and valuable suggestions. To ensure the quality of the revised version, we invited a professional editor to have a thorough check on the manuscript. If there are any questions in the article that need further revision, we are willing to improve it. We look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you very much for your favorable consideration on our MS.
Following are the reviewer’s comments and our response to the comments:
Reviewer: 2
Comments and Suggestions for Authors
The authors presented a manuscript entitled “Hydraulic trait variation with tree height affects fruit quality of walnut trees under drought stress”. This article reports on the effects of different irrigation treatments and tree height on the physiology, growth and fruit quality of common walnut (Juglans regia L.) as the target species. The language quality is good.
In my opinion, elucidation of the influence of variation in hydraulic architecture with increasing tree height on fruit quality within the canopy, especially under drought stress, is very important to breeding of cultivated fruit trees. However, due to some technical deficiencies in the manuscript, I recommend “minor revision”
Reply: Many thanks to the reviewer for his or her constructive comments and regret for the minor errors. According to the minor comments, we fixed the error and hoped to improve the quality of the articles.
Minor comments:
(1) Lines 210-211: Change “Using” into “We used” Origin 9.0 software to process relevant charts (Origin Lab Corp., Northampton, MA, USA)”.
Reply: Thanks. Correction has done (P. 5 L.34 in track changed MS).
(2) It has been reported that “soil water potential at 0-90 cm was 0.73 MPa in the EI group, 0.42 MPa in the CI group, and 0.18 MPa in the DI group”. Accordingly, in Figure 1, please reconsider switching places of the graphic columns, error bars and letters for DI and EI treatments.
Reply: Sorry for the poor writing and wrong expression. The correction has done (P. 5 L.44 - 46 in track changed MS). It should be “the average soil water potential at 0-90cm was -0.73 MPa in the DI group, -0.42 MPa in the CI group, and -0.18 MPa in the EI group”.
(3) Trend in lettering is “A” i.e. “a” for the highest values. Hence, reconsider lettering for the Figure 1 and Figure 2a. Error bars and letters are missing in Figure 6d.
Reply: Sorry for the mistakes. We have repotted the Figure 1 & Figure 2a and relabeled the letters to make it right. As we had explained in the reviewer 1, logistical feasibility precluded our ability to investigate more trees (labor intensive to manually break the shell of walnut for many trees). So we do have no replicates for the no kernel or deflated kernel (NDK) rates.
(4) The Conclusions section is too taxatively written, please revise it and emphasize the scientific contribution of the presented work.
Reply: Thanks. We have rewritten the conclusions section to emphasize the scientific contribution of the current work (P. 16 L.40-51 and P. 17 L.1-3 in track changed MS).
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
The paper Hydraulic trait variation with tree height affects fruit quality of 2 walnut trees under drought stress is scientifically valuable as it considered the walnut - a fruit-growing species with important ecologic and economic characteristics, widely appreciated for its nutritional value.
OBSERVATION: Please specify the irrigation method you have used in the paper as well as the soil characteristics where the walnut crop is situated!!!
The content is in accord with title.
The size of the article is appropriate to the contents.
The Abstract is OK.
The key words permit found article in the current registers or indexes.
The methods are well described and the equipment and materials have been adequately described.
The paper was written in standard, grammatically correct English.
The figures have a good quality.
The table contains necessary results.
The Conclusion is OK.
The paper has the text presented and arranged clearly and concisely.
Author Response
Dear reviewer:
We have carefully revised the manuscript (Manuscript ID: agronomy-1799992) according to your comments, the detailed responses to the comments are listed below point-by-point, with original comments in black and our responses in blue. We would like to thank the anonymous reviewer for his or her kind comments and valuable suggestions. To ensure the quality of the revised version, we invited a professional editor to have a thorough check on the manuscript. If there are any questions in the article that need further revision, we are willing to improve it. We look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you very much for your favorable consideration on our MS.
Following are the reviewer’s comments and our response to the comments:
Reviewer: 3
The paper Hydraulic trait variation with tree height affects fruit quality of walnut trees under drought stress is scientifically valuable as it considered the walnut - a fruit-growing species with important ecologic and economic characteristics, widely appreciated for its nutritional value.
OBSERVATION: Please specify the irrigation method you have used in the paper as well as the soil characteristics where the walnut crop is situated!!!
Reply: Thanks for your positive and constructive comments. Based on your detailed comments, we have made the following changes to our article. We add words to explain our irrigation methods (P. 3 L.40-41) and soil characteristics in the research area (P. 3 L.29-34).
The content is in accord with title.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The size of the article is appropriate to the contents.
Reply: Thanks.
The Abstract is OK.
Reply: Thanks.
The key words permit found article in the current registers or indexes.
Reply: Thanks.
The methods are well described and the equipment and materials have been adequately described.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The paper was written in standard, grammatically correct English.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The figures have a good quality.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The table contains necessary results.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The Conclusion is OK.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
The paper has the text presented and arranged clearly and concisely.
Reply: Thanks for the positive comments.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
