Impact of Land Cover Changes on Soil Type Mapping in Plain Areas: Evidence from Tongzhou District of Beijing, China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript entitled “Impact of Land Cover Changes on Soil Mapping in Plain Areas: Evidence from Tongzhou District of Beijing, China”, by X. Wu, K. Wu, H. Zhao, S. Hao, L. Kang and Z. Zhou, presents an interesting work.
In general, the manuscript should be acceptable for publication but some problems must be repaired prior to publication. Some suggestions are as follows:
- Please follow the journal author instructions. It would be useful for the reader to follow the classical text structure (i.e. Introduction-methodology-results-discussion-conclusions). A better presentation of your results and an extensive discussion would improve your paper.
- I suggest to separate the chapter “4. Discussion and Conclusion”.
- Please use different terms in the “Title” and the “Keywords”.
- It would be useful to be described the aim of this paper.
- The English language usage should be checked by a fluent English speaker. It is suggested to the authors to take the assistance of someone with English as mother tongue.
- You could enrich the scientific literature.
- Please justify convincingly why this manuscript (method, thematology etc) connected with LAND’s content and scope. Perhaps the using of proper literature from this journal would be helpful.
- The authors could take into account the following publications: https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences12100367 & https://doi.org/10.3390/land10050502
- Please use coordinates in all maps.
- When you are using coordinates, please do not use “North Arrow”. This is a mistake in cartography.
- Correct references in the text and the reference list according to the journal’s format. Please format the references’ list by using the correct journal abbreviations. See the following link: https://images.webofknowledge.com/images/help/WOS/A_abrvjt.html
- Which is the title of journals in 10th, 15th, 17th reference etc.
- Please be careful with the spaces between the words.
Moderate editing of English language is required
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The manuscript entitled: “Impact of Land Cover Changes on Soil Mapping in Plain Areas: Evidence from Tongzhou District of Beijing, China” presents interesting study on land cover changes at regional scale and relation with soil mapping. However, the manuscript contains some drawbacks:
1. Line 100-101: Please add the reference to the Chinese soil classification system (publication which is available).
2. Please follow the guidelines for authors. Citations in the text should be as numbers not using surnames of the authors.
3. The aim of the study, which is presented in the end of introduction is not clear. Soil mapping can indicate various characteristics, please specify what soil properties were most important in this study and is the aim of the soil mapping (for what purpose).
4. For what period is NDVI presented in maps in Fig. 2. It is for total year or for selected period only? Please specify. How the map 2c was created? It was interpolated using point data? What was the source of the data?
5. Line 225, equation 2: Please replace alpha by other letter, because alpha is usually used as level of significance. In this case it is parameter for which the CI is calculated and it would be more clear if other letter was used.
6. Figure 3 is not clear. It is not clear what was changed during the period and what was without the changes. I suggest to present the changes using ribbon chart.
7. The legends in Fig. 4 are not clear. I suggest to show only one legend, but of bigger size.
8. Line 318-322: Could you define wat is the definition of soil change? Soil is very stable in time and even if the land cover/land use is changing the soil type usually is the same for very long period. Because soil change can be differently classified such definition can be quite different and areas of soil change will be very different.
9. Discussion is very poor. In the discussion the results should be compared to the similar results from other studies. In the discussion is only one reference. It is rather extended description of the results, not discussion. Some conclusions are very obvious and general, e.g. “human activities play a dominant role in the process of land cover changes”, it is trivial.
10. The references are not formatted according guidelines for authors (e.g. journal names should abbreviated and written in italic). Moreover, some parts of the manuscript are not exactly formatted according the guidelines.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear Authors,
Several comments and suggestions were provided that should be followed by the authors during the revision process.
Good luck.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Moderate editing of English language required.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript entitled “Impact of Land Cover Changes on Soil Type Mapping in Plain Areas: Evidence from Tongzhou District of Beijing,China”, by X. Wu, K. Wu, H. Zhao, S. Hao, Q. Huang, & Z. Zhou, presents an improved and good work.
The manuscript should be acceptable for publication in the present form.
Minor editing of English language is required
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The manuscript was improved according all my comments. However, the layout of the manuscript is completely different than the template of the journal. Please use the template which is in the guidelines for authors.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear Authors, Thank you for your efforts to revise your manuscript. However, a few more revisions are necessary. Good luck.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Minor editing of English language required.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
