Low Cost and Easy to Implement Physical and Hydrological Soil Assessment of Shade-Grown Coffee in Santa Rosa, Guatemala

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript "Low Cost and Easy to Implement Physical and Hydrological Soil Assessment of Shade-Grown Coffee in Santa Rosa, Guatemala" presents a simple methodology for the assessment of soil properties under coffee agroecosystems. The authors focused on minimizing the number of properties and required tools to make it economically attainable to local farmers in Guatemala, a country with a large number of people under the line of poverty.
There are only a few minor observations that need to be addressed:
L-42, it is not the case for all tropical regions, such as Brazil (No 1 producer of coffee in the world). I suggest the authors revise:
Silva et al., 2019. Soil moisture associated with least limiting water range, leaf water potential, initial growth and yield of coffee as affected by soil management system. Soil and Tillage Research, 189, pp. 36-43. DOI: 10.1016/j.still.2018.12.016.
L154: ... no clouds in the sky,...

 

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Reviewer 2 Report

1. In present study, low cost and easy soil assessment to implement physical and hydrological traits of shade-grown coffee were studied. However, why called low cost and easy should be indicated, and why chosen different shade-grown coffee treatment?

2. Table 2， the reason for the difference of Canopy Cover, Vegetation height of tree, and DBH between CN and CP were complex, as No. of tree were different, and the cultivation years were different, and even also others? Why only two treatments?

3. Table 3 indicated diverse plants cultivated in different treatments, therefore, the soil characteristics may be varied according to the diverse plants, we can not attributed to the different treatment. Meanwhile, the soil texture were different. Therefore, the soil characteristics were complex and it’s formation were not clearly indentified.

4. L389-393, no informative information was present;

5. Results, delete no informative sentence

6. Discussion, should compared with previous literature with present results

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Reviewer 3 Report

Dear authors,

Thank you for a well-presented paper regarding sound scientific research.

This investigation yielded encouraging results and proved again the applicability of the SSBI method for a plausible estimation of Ks by the near steady-state phase of a Beerkan infiltration run, in the evaluation of different land uses. It is of high practical relevance and makes a contribution to the field of study.

All the best

 

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Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Base on the reponse, we clarified that the novelty was insufficient, and the research area was limited that can not arised widely concern. Meanwhile, the data accuracy was not sufficient.

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