The Decline and Possible Return of Silvipastoral Agroforestry in Sweden
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
A theoretical well based historical and actual inside into the topic.
Especially interesting for countries in mountain areas and eastern Europe
Author Response
No revisions needed.
Reviewer 2 Report
I read the manuscript thoroughly. In my opinion, the manuscript is very interesting and gives the future and present status of the silvopasture Agroforestry of Sweden. The results in the manuscript are suitable for the understanding condition of silvopastoral Agroforestry in Sweden for the scientific community of international readers. The authors have written it nicely and provided valuable information in this manuscript. All my comments are below:
Comments:
The abstract section needs to incorporate more results about the status of the silvopasture Agroforestry system of Sweden by adding a few lines of conclusion in this section.
The introduction of the manuscript needs to add some new references and the objective of the study.
Please rewrite materials and methods by adding or incorporating the suitable references considered for the generated data.
The data given in the supplementary file can be used to make a table or figure and incorporate it into the manuscript.
The photos given in the supplementary file show duplicity, please delete the duplicate photos and among them take some photos that can be used in the manuscript.
Please make a suitable table and figures and then rewrite the results, discussion, and conclusion.
Hopeful my submitted comments help in improving the manuscript.
Author Response
The abstract section needs to incorporate more results about the status of the silvopasture Agroforestry system of Sweden by adding a few lines of conclusion in this section.
Response: Short information on the current extent of silvipastoral agroforestry in Sweden has been added to the abstract. Abstract is not allowed to contain more than 200 words, so “a few lines of conclusion” cannot be added.
The introduction of the manuscript needs to add some new references and the objective of the study.
Response: Some new references has been added. The objective (aim) of the study appears from the last paragraph of the Introduction: “The aim of this review is to describe how the occurrence of silvipastoral agroforestry has developed in Sweden to the present time, and to discuss how the future development might be. …”
Please rewrite materials and methods by adding or incorporating the suitable references considered for the generated data. The Academic Editor has a similar remark: Please elaborate on your methods section and state clearly the source of your "historical overviews". Perhaps a table or a figure showing the source per period of time.
Response: At the end of Materials and Methods, a tableau has been inserted with references to our "historical overviews" and other parts of the article. Also the sources on line 63-64 have been extended.
The data given in the supplementary file can be used to make a table or figure and incorporate it into the manuscript. The Academic Editor has a similar remark: “Consider incorporating a few of your supplementary figures into the main text. This will improve the aesthetic quality of your paper”.
Response: We have made two new figures, Fig 1 and 2, based on images in the supplementary file and placed these figures in the Results section together with associated text, which has been extended.
The photos given in the supplementary file show duplicity, please delete the duplicate photos and among them take some photos that can be used in the manuscript.
Response: Yes, there is duplicity in the supplementary file. This is because the same image has in some cases been used in different sub-studies. So e.g. "Silvipastoral agroforestry with old birches" is used both in the sub-studies 2016 and 2019:1. They must be included in both cases so that the reader can see which alternatives the respondents had to rank in the various sub-studies. The duplicity is therefore necessary.
Please make a suitable table and figures and then rewrite the results, discussion, and conclusion.
Response: The new Figures 1 and 2 illustrate what silvipastoral agroforestry in Sweden can be and the already existing Tables 1 and 2 illustrate the landscape and economic advantages of silvipastoral agroforestry in Sweden, which are important conclusions in our article. We have tried to create additional figures and tables that better illustrate important results but were unsuccessful. "Rewrite the results, discussion, and conclusion" would be a very extensive work and we have not received any concrete information about shortcomings in the current results, discussion, and conclusion sections that should prompt rewriting. Furthermore, none of the other reviewers or the Academic Editor has required such rewriting. We must receive more concrete criticism if we are to be able to fulfill the request to rewrite most of the article.
Reviewer 3 Report
The article "The Decline and Possible Return of Silvipastoral Agroforestry in Sweden" is very interesting and presents problems in Sweden.
Please make corrections:
Lines 91-92 The author quotes [4]: „It is unknown how the trees were distributed but they were probably not evenly spread.“ This quote should be deleted. Author Olsson R. should check it out. The source of this information is rich Swedish paintings. For example: Frukost i det gröna, 1913, Lilla Hyttäs, Sundborn; Rävfamiljen, 1886, Bruno Liljefors; Skogen, 1892, Konstmuseum, Göteborg.
Line 164: "post-war period" - after what war?
Author Response
Lines 91-92 The author quotes [4]: „It is unknown how the trees were distributed but they were probably not evenly spread.“ This quote should be deleted. Author Olsson R. should check it out. The source of this information is rich Swedish paintings. For example: Frukost i det gröna, 1913, Lilla Hyttäs, Sundborn; Rävfamiljen, 1886, Bruno Liljefors; Skogen, 1892, Konstmuseum, Göteborg.
Response: This information has now been added into the text, now lines 116-117.
Line 164: "post-war period" - after what war?
Response: World War II, which has now been clarified, now line 189.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors, I am grateful for your good work and did a nice job in reviewing the manuscript. The manuscript is written very nicely but still needs to improve the results, discussion, and conclusion and after that, it is suitable for publication.
The results section has lots of references used by the authors they must be removed and these references are used in the discussion section.
On the basis of old references, a table must be prepared and results must be written in the results section. After that discussion and conclusion should be written. The authors made or incorporate the new figures, but did they discuss them in the discussion, it must be discussed in this section
Author Response
Reviewer 2: The authors, I am grateful for your good work and did a nice job in reviewing the manuscript. The manuscript is written very nicely but still needs to improve the results, discussion, and conclusion and after that, it is suitable for publication.
Response: We are grateful for the thoroughgoing review. This comment is similar to the comment in review 1 from the same reviewer. In review 1, the editor did not, in his/her remark, asked us to handle that comment. Beside the reviewer comments below, the comments are not more concrete this time than in review 1, as we have not done any general changes according to this comment. Furthermore, the editor has not asked us especially to consider any special aspects of the reviewer comments this time. We don’t think the editor want us to rewrite Result, Discussion and Conclusion sections as this procedure could not be regarded as minor revisions.
Reviewer 2: The results section has lots of references used by the authors they must be removed and these references are used in the discussion section.
Response: We understand this comment as the reviewer does not think there should be any references in the Result section, but in the Discussion section only. Please notice this is a review article, where references usually also are found in the Result section. No changes according to this comment has therefore been undertaken.
Reviewer 2: On the basis of old references, a table must be prepared and results must be written in the results section.
Response: According to the editor’s suggestion in revision 1, we have added the table asked for in the method section, line 82-102.
Reviewer 2: The authors made or incorporate the new figures, but did they discuss them in the discussion, it must be discussed in this section
Response: We have now added references and some text belonging to these two new figures in the Discussion section, line 535-544.
