Twenty-Eight Years of Plant Community Development and Dynamics in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana, USA
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report (New Reviewer)
Congratulations for this important manuscript. Long-term studies are highly relevant in a changing world.
Since you are studying dominance, it world have been interesting to quantify it with a proper Dominance Index (e.g. SIMPSON of Berger-Parker). However, you do not have individual species counts which make the application of Hill numbers impossible. I suggest mention in the Discussion the need to quantify individual species abundance (counting individuals) in future Long-term studies.
MINOR CHANGES
-Starting in line 162 with Alternanthera philoxeroides, add the authorship to a given species the first time you mention it.
-In line 271 there is a space missing “2.3Analyss…”
Author Response
Thank you for your kind review. We have added the recommendation for count of individuals in future studies in the discussion. We did not add the authorities to the species, because they are provided in Table 1, but we added a note in the text to direct the reader to the table. We added the recommended space.
Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)
Reviewer comments
Journal: Water (ISSN 2073-4441)
Manuscript ID: water-2546203
Title: “Twenty-Eight Years of Plant Community Development and Dynamics in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana, USA".
I previously reviewed that manuscript about two months ago, and I made a number of comments on it at that time, and the two researchers re-submitted it to the journal again, but I noticed that they did not respond to the previous comments before re-uploading it a second time, which was intended to improve that manuscript. Please respond to the previous comments besides the following:
- In the title, pls remove “Twenty-Eight Years of”
- Keywords: please capitalize the first letter.
- The problem of the manuscript must be mentioned clearly, as well as its novelty in the abstract part, and a brief of the methodology must be mentioned.
- L 10: “(1984–2012)” What is the relationship between the current study and the last twenty years from 2012 to 2022? Were any comparisons made between the previous period and that period, or not? Pls clarify.
- The authors may add some graphical illustration or graphical abstract to explain how different Plant Community in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, changed through twenty-eight years.
- L33: “(sensu lato” ????
- L 36-37: add relevant reference.
- Please describe the importance of the research, its novelty, and the expected results briefly in the last paragraph of the introduction.
- L 40-42: "Humanity has generally impacted deltas in two opposite ways; by upstream deforestation adding erosional sediment and sediment deprivation by damming which drives land loss " add relevant reference.
- "Mississippi River" It was mentioned in the manuscript 35 times, but it was not abbreviated except for the fourth time only (Line 58), so why?? The term must be written in its entirety and the abbreviation in the first time it is mentioned only, and then the abbreviation should be written only after that in the entire manuscript. This must be taken into account in similar cases.
- L 63-71: unclear sentences, pls paraphrase.
- L 77-79: “The respective durations between accretion and subsidence, in the shallow estuarine waters produce the mud platforms for plant communities to take hold at their particular elevation requirements. Below at low water levels is a mudflat, whereas above becomes a wetland” what is the source of these information.
- There is no clear statistical analysis of the results at the end of the methodological section
- L146-148: In addition, lobes decline in elevation perpendicular to the shore of the sediment supplying feeder pass and are typically assumed delineated at the emergent vegetation boundary though the lobe’s substrate continues to slope towards the receiving pond’s bottom often over considerable distance. what is the source of these information?
- In table 1 there is something incorrect or understandable, which is the value of the total calculation and the percentage in front of it for each group of species, especially since you calculated all the percentages on the final total
- Figure 1: This form contains a lot of information, which makes it difficult to track and understand that information easily. If this form could be simplified and its information reduced and focused, it would be good.
- The lines in figure (5) Overlapping and incomprehensible, which makes it difficult to track or track the direction of the results, please simplify the format as much as possible
- L 493, line 495: “3rd” “4th” change it to superscript and pay attention to this comment in similar cases in the entire manuscript.
- Due to the large number of abbreviations in the entire manuscript, it is preferable to make a complete table of these abbreviations at the beginning of the manuscript and delete them all from the entire manuscript afterwards, especially from the bottom of the tables and figures.
- Resolution of figure 6 is very poor. Kindly improve.
- In all parts of the discussion section, the authors have to write a brief of the current study in the first, then discuss this result.
- Discussion needs to be improved. Please discuss the possible mechanism behind your results. Avoid comparing with others work.
- The overall manuscript lacks discussion. I could not find any meaningful discussions in the Results and discussion part of the manuscript. Please add more in-depth discussions in the manuscript.
- For the discussion part, please end with a summary of conclusions regarding the significance of the work and suggestions for future studies.
- Why the authors did not write the conclusion part, it is very important, pls rewire in in the corrected form (This part is rewritten in accordance with the outputs of that manuscript without citing previous studies, as this was previously mentioned in the introduction part, but here the writing is done briefly and summarizing all the outstanding results in the current study only and without prolongation or repetition of what was previously presented in other parts of that manuscript). Add future perspectives at the end of conclusion
- The presentation and scientific writing are good but minor revisions to improve them.
- There is a critical point: “There is no evidence in the materials and methods part of the statistical methods used in the interpretation of the results, and because this is one of the most important things that must be included, it is necessary to write this part in more detail”
- L 986: “CO2” have to subscript
- Besides the previous suggestions, a thorough proof-check (punctuation, spelling/typing) and most importantly English language is recommended. Please fully revise the manuscript based on my comments, providing details on how and where each change was made in the text
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)
Reviewer comments-R2
Journal: Water (ISSN 2073-4441)
Manuscript ID: water-2546203
Title: “Twenty-Eight Years of Plant Community Development and Dynamics in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana, USA".
Please respond to the previous comments besides the following:
- In the title, pls remove “Twenty-Eight Years of”
- Keywords: please capitalize the first letter.
- The problem of the manuscript must be mentioned clearly, as well as its novelty in the abstract part, and a brief of the methodology must be mentioned.
- The authors may add some graphical illustration or graphical abstract to explain how different Plant Community in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, changed through twenty-eight years.
- L33: “(sensu lato” ????
- In a clear sentence, please describe the importance of the research, its novelty, and the expected results briefly in the last paragraph of the introduction.
- L 132: “we” do not use the personal pronouns in the entire manuscript
- In addition, lobes decline in elevation perpendicular to the shore of the sediment supplying feeder pass and are typically assumed delineated at the emergent vegetation boundary though the lobe’s substrate continues to slope towards the receiving pond’s bottom often over considerable distance. what is the source of these information?
- Discussion needs to be improved. Please discuss the possible mechanism behind your results. Avoid comparing with others work.
- Why the authors did not write the conclusion part, it is very important, pls rewire in in the corrected form (This part is rewritten in accordance with the outputs of that manuscript without citing previous studies, as this was previously mentioned in the introduction part, but here the writing is done briefly and summarizing all the outstanding results in the current study only and without prolongation or repetition of what was previously presented in other parts of that manuscript). Add future perspectives at the end of conclusion
- Besides the previous suggestions, a thorough proof-check (punctuation, spelling/typing) and most importantly English language is recommended. Please fully revise the manuscript based on my comments, providing details on how and where each change was made in the text
Comments for author File: Comments.docx
Minor editing of English language required
Author Response
Please see attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Authors, after resubmission, the paper has improved, but:
- the work is still too long
- the answers given to the research questions are not clear
- discussions do not have a links to the cited literature
- the conclusions are missing
I suggest a revision of EnglishReviewer 2 Report
Reviewer comments-R1
Journal: Water (ISSN 2073-4441)
Manuscript ID: water-2492906
Title: “Twenty-Eight Years of Plant Community Development and Dynamics in the Balize Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana, USA".
After revising the entire attached manuscript for second time and after take the response of the authors to my previous comments into consideration, I found that:
Besides the following suggestions, a thorough proof-check (punctuation, spelling/typing) and most importantly English language is recommended. Please fully revise the manuscript based on my comments, providing details on how and where each change was made in the text
- “Twenty-Eight Years of” delete from the title.
- L 10: “(1984–2012)” What is the relationship between the current study and the last twenty years from 2012 to 2022? Were any comparisons made between the previous period and that period, or not?
- L 25-26: “keywords” Keywords: please capitalize the first letter. landscape ecology is not the focus of this research.
- Please rephrase the sentence “The details of how deltaic wetland plant communities are created, maintained, and even environmentally impacted by the providing river has great relevance to their ecology.” in lines 36-38.
- L 36-38: add relevant reference.
- L 52-54: add relevant reference.
- L77-79: add relevant reference.
- L85-88: Please rephrase the sentence is these lines.
- Figure 1: This form contains a lot of information, which makes it difficult to track and understand that information easily. If this form could be simplified and its information reduced and focused, it would be good.
- In all parts of the discussion section, the authors have to write a brief of the current study in the first, then discuss this result.
-
- Discussion needs to be improved. Please discuss the possible mechanism behind your results. Avoid comparing with others work.
- Why the authors removed the conclusion part, it is very important, pls rewire in in the corrected form (This part is rewritten in accordance with the outputs of that manuscript without citing previous studies, as this was previously mentioned in the introduction part, but here the writing is done briefly and summarizing all the outstanding results in the current study only and without prolongation or repetition of what was previously presented in other parts of that manuscript). Add future perspectives at the end of conclusion
- The presentation and scientific writing are good but minor revisions to improve them.
- The most figures were improved and the tables are also clear. So, the current manuscript will be deserved a minor revision before consideration for publication in Water -MDPI.
- There is a critical point: “There is no evidence in the materials and methods part of the statistical methods used in the interpretation of the results, and because this is one of the most important things that must be included, it is necessary to write this part in more detail”
Comments for author File: Comments.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
The main drawback of the manuscript, as it was pointed out in the first review, seems to me to be the lack of discussion and explanation of the ecosystem functions of the studied vegetation, how these functions are affected by the revealed dynamics of vegetation? The authors clarified that this is a phytosociological study and these issues were not within the scope of this study. I understand the importance of phytosociological research, but in this case, it is not clear why the article was submitted not to any botanical journal, but to the journal Water.
As for minor comments, the authors wrote that they corrected them. But that is not the case with my comments. Most of them were ignored by the authors. Obviously, the authors are not at all obliged to take into account all the comments of the reviewers, but the reviewer has the right to expect a respectful attitude towards his time, which could be expressed in the response of the authors point by point.
However, these little things do not affect my final opinion. This manuscript is a good phytosociological study, but in my opinion, as an outside expert, it does not fit the subject of the journal Water. However, the decision on the thematic suitability of the article is beyond my competence. This is the responsibility of the editorial board.
