Impact of Controlled Drainage and Subirrigation on Water Quality in the Red River Valley
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Review:
Impact of Controlled Drainage and Subirrigation on Water 2 Quality in the Red River Valley
Manuscript Number: water-1071657
This paper is trying to provide insight into the applicability and environmental benefit of CD and SI practices in the Red River Valley of southeastern North Dakota from 2012-2018.
A resubmission should consider and need to clarified the following aspects and concerns.
Major comments:
- It is needed to present the objectives of the study clearer and more concise (l. 77-86)
- There is a confusion about the kind of water which were used in each time for SI. Please give more information.
- Abbreviations are sometimes used without explanation or are not explained the first time they appear
Specific comments
l.41. You should insert CD in the l. 12 where you refer the first time
l.53. The same as above for SI
- 77. RRV. What does you mean? Please explain
l.111. Please gives the range of years from which the average annual precipitation was estimated
l.116-117. Conductance sensor. Please explain how is working to estimate the water level and flow rate changes
l.122-126. Why two types of rain gauges were used?
- 144. FD What does you mean? Please explain
- 146-147. SI was when water was pumped back into the field. Give more information. I think that it is better to write a new subsection
l.179. Ammonium acetate method. Give reference
l.187-188. In the equation 2 the value of SAR is referred to saturated paste derived sodium adsorption ratio (SARe) (DeSutter et al.,2015). In the l.188 you write that 1:1 slurry was used. Please explain
l.192. Put a number in the subsection “Flow and nutrient load calculations”
l.261-262. It is better to give the positive relationship
l.296-297. “…residual SI water in the soil”. Give explanations
l.302-303. “The other two parameters, percent sodium in the SI samples and sulfate in every CD and SI sample, had little or no direct effect on the surface water”. Why?
l.484-501. You should to rewrite the conclusion section so that to present concisely the basic results and conclusions
Author Response
We have addressed all of your comments. Please see attached with point to point responses.
Thank you!
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
water-21-1071657 Impact of Controlled Drainage and Subirrigation on Water Quality in the Red River Valley
This paper discusses interesting an interesting situation in which drainage is used in soils with a risk of salinization, a fertile valley important to the economies of a couple of states in North America.
In the present study, the Authors collected and analysed for chemical concentrations from a tile drained field that also has controlled drainage and sub-irrigation.
They conclude essentially saying that the space-time variability of the characteristics of water is higher than that of the soil. In my opinion, to conclude by saying that the soil compensates / buffers, even qualitatively, the input of different irrigation waters is a conclusion that is not at all trivial.
The manuscript contains a lot of information. This fact, in itself, makes the paper worthwhile.
This manuscript adheres to the journal’s standards. The research meets the applicable standards for the research integrity. The article does not adhere to appropriate reporting guidelines and community standards for data availability: the complete raw database is not yet made completely available in a public repository, such as Zenodo, for instance.
The research output, in terms of novelty, scores good uniqueness in terms of data. The level of clarity is well above the threshold of acceptability, as well as the state of the art and the comparative discussion. It adopts up to date methodologies in respect to the object of research. The paper does not fully discuss the limitations of the approach and potential biases due to the assumptions made.
Potentially, its potential impact upon the international scientific community of reference is good. The study presents the results of primary scientific research. Experiments, statistics, and other analyses are performed to a sound technical standard and are described in detail. Conclusions presented are innovative.
The article is presented in a intelligible manner. This work has impact and may add something important to the knowledge base.
In particular (page.row):
2.74 mineralogy
2.95 to increase the global usability of the manuscript, please add the equivalent WRB (IUSS WG WRB, 2015) to this very useful ST classification of soils
3.101 binomial nomenclature requires italics. In scientific works, the authority for a binomial name is usually given, at least when it is first mentioned (e.g., Beta vulgaris L.)
4.151 NOx and PO4 are wrong nomenclatures, the first because it is used for nitrogen oxides in the air while the second needs the three negative charges as superscript. I suggest writing in full and clearly what N and P refer to, but then simply using the letter indicating the chemical element.
4.162 Please, mention the APHA used method. And, when possible, please refer to ISO methods
5.213 Hardness total needs clarification
7.251 Figure 2 is a key figure. It is not easily readable at the moment, within this layout. I would add (above) land use, seed-harvest-bare soil. Stylistically, I like the blue rush best, but I realize it's just a matter of personal preference.
10.350 Nutrient containing solution is normally retained by the soil, the potential for a subsequent loss is increased under aerobic conditions: the management of drainage systems should try avoiding the onset of anaerobic conditions (e.g., DOI: 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2013.09.01)
12.409 Speculative
References
IUSS Working Group WRB. 2015. World Reference Base for Soil Resources 2014, update 2015 International soil classification system for naming soils and creating legends for soil maps. World Soil Resources Reports No. 106. FAO, Roma IT EU, 192 p.
Recommendation: MODERATE REVISION
Author Response
We have addressed all your questions. Please see attached with point to point responses.
Thank you!
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Evaluation
The authors present the results of several years of research on the impact of two drainage management practices (control drainage and sub-irrigation) on water quality in the Red River Valley (USA, North Dacota). The manuscript is well written and the overall layout of the work is correct and legible. The introduction provides sufficient background and supports the research topic of the study. The description of the research methodology used is accurate and exhaustive. However, the chapter "Results and Discussion" needs some clarifications and improvements before considering to publish this manuscript (see comments below).
All suggestions and specific comments are listed below:
-p.5, line 192: “Flow and nutrient load calculations” – it should be highlighted as a separate subsection
- Table 2, Table 3 and Table 4: I recommend to rephrase the title of each table. The title should contain general information about what the table concerns, while detailed explanations of the abbreviations used in the table and information on the statistical analysis should be provided below the table. It will be helpful to the reader. In addition, the results in these Tables should be given as mean ± standard deviation (or mean and confidence intervals); the sample size (n=?) should be also specified.
- lines 298-299: “Compared to the water quality standard for surface waters…” – it will be useful to put the values of these water quality standards e.g. in Table 2.
- line 365-373: It is unclear to which results this description applies
- lines 437-438: “the coefficient of determination value between cumulative load and cumulative outflow…” - these results are not shown in the paper
- Table 5: as in other Tables, the results should be presented as mean +standard deviation (instead of separately) and the statistical evaluation of the results and sample size should be given
- line 453: it should be “the highest EC of 1.40 dS/m…”
- line 470-471: please change 2015 to 2014 in the following sentences “SAR values in 2015 are the lowest out of the three years of data. 2015 was also the 470 only year to show SAR increase as distance above the tile increases.”
Author Response
We have addressed all of your comments. Please see attached. Thanks!
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
The revived paper presents results of impact of controlled drainage and subirrigation on water and soil quality. In the study, water samples were collected and analyzed for chemical concentrations from a tile drained field in southeastern North Dakota from 2012 to 2018. Also analysis of soil chemical properties was conducted. I have the following comments (suggestions):
- The title of the paper suggests that the research is conducted in the Red River Valley and covers a large area of the valley.In fact, the research covered an area of 44 ha, and the name of the Red river does not appear in the main text (except introduction), there is no river marked on the map (Fig. 1).I'm afraid most journal readers don't know where the Red River is, but they know where the Dakota is.I would suggest making the title of the article more specific.
- Please correct the data presented in Table 1 (precipitation = rainfall + snow water equivalent) 418+65=483 mm in the table is 484 mm). Data for drainage and subirrigation are average for the east and the west sump or the esat sump?
- Figure 1 can be improved (the same symbols for upstream and downstream are used, what means symbol //). Field profile layout from the north to the south will be useful for riders to understand the drainage system.
- In Fig 2. Authors present data for the east sump. Why not for booth part of the field? In this figure is possible to mark periods where you have: FD-Spring, CD-Spring, SI, CD-Fall and FD-
- Line 53 – SI ? (explanation of SI is in Line 63), Line 83 – ND ? (please explain), Line 100-101 Latin names of crops should be in italic, Line 192 - section title?
Author Response
Please see attached with point to point responses to your comments. Thanks!
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Τhe manuscript has been significantly improved and now warrants publication in Water.
