Longitudinal Changes in Milk Microorganisms in the First Two Months of Lactation of Primiparous and Multiparous Cows

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please check carefully the language used in the manuscript.

The number of sampled animals could be higher.

line 54 - what Authors mean by "good temperature"?

line 55 "more research"

line 73 -please do not compare cow milk with sow milk

Introduction part is quite erratic and needs some more work  - are we focusing on healthy cows or mastitic cows? and what is new in this study design/goals?

Please give more details about the cows in test groups.

Any SCC confirming health - or other tests?

Fig. 2 is not very well readable

4. Disussion

line 409 - please do not compare primates and cows

line 428 - rumen - not mammary gland! please be aware of two places of milk fat production

Discussion part needs some work as well, the reviewer would prefer to follow the idea of time points changes, not simple group analysis - and the most - Authors interpretation of the results. How Authors were avoiding environmental contamination of the samples?

lines 561-562 - no basis for such declarations in the article. How did authors check potential probiotic values of the microbes?  and what about the microbial risks of raw fresh milk?

The part relating biota with milk biochemistry is very limited.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

I have read the manuscript and come to the following comments:

-        In line 41: The authors wrote a component (lactoprotein). As far as I know, this term is not used. It is better to use the total protein so that everyone can understand. The term needs to be changed throughout the manuscript (On page 214, in Table 3 and in Figure 7).

-        In line 54: The authors wrote the word breast for the mammary gland in cows. But this word is not used in cow and the correct word is the udder.

-        Unfortunately, the literature cited in the text is not written correctly according to the journal line. For example, in lines 58 and 59, the date of publication could not be given here, but would have to be entered in the references list and a number is inserted here that refers to the following series of numbers in the text. This needs to change in lines 68, 72, 80 and 449 as well.

-        In line 104: The authors mentioned that the animals were fed ad libitum. In this situation, the cows take a lot of concentrated feed. The results are that they get sick.

-        Under 2.3. Sample Collection: It was written that the milk samples were taken at a certain time after calving. However, the authors did not mention when the cows were milked prior to collecting the milk samples because the time span affects the chemical components of milk samples.

-        In line 184: The authors have the title: Bioinformatical and Statistical Analysis. In line 212: The authors wrote the same title: Bioinformatical and Statistical Analysis. Why?

-        In line 278 (Table 2): The authors reported the mean relative percentage of dominant microbiota at each time point. But when I add up the percentages at each time point, I do not get 100%. Is there an explanation?

-        In Table 3: Milk Urea Nitrogen was given as a percentage. The question is: is that correct? For urea in the milk, we usually give the concentration in mg/dl and the normal concentration should be between 10 and 15 mg/dl.

-        The authors wrote the title on line 215: 3. Results and on line 395 I see the same title written (4. Results). What is that?

-        On line 408: The reference number must immediately follow the name, as follows: Muletz et a. (25) and not as written. This also applies to references in lines 416 (Maity et al.), 427 (Jami et al.,) and 474 (Kuehn et al.).

-        The reference list is correct, only reference 55 is included in the reference list but not present in the text.

 

I hope, these comments will be considered. 

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

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Reviewer 4 Report

 

Overall, an interesting piece of work. My main comment is that in the discussion section 4, the work is discussed well on a scientific basis, but I miss a part of the impact of this work. I.e., why are the observed differences relevant and what impact would it have for e.g., milk quality and/or products made from such milk? I think this relevance could help elevate the discussion

 

Few other comments:

-Section 4 is named ‘results’ but should be named ‘discussion’ I think?

-Figure 4 is very difficult to read with the rather light grey background

-Are bacterial numbers (even total plate count) available for the milk samples? This would be beneficial

-Table 3 needs careful checking. I assume what the authors refer to as ‘lactoprotein’ is simply ‘protein’ and should be corrected everywhere. For urea nitrogen, either values or units are incorrect.

 

 

 

Author Response

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Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The Authors followed the suggestions of the reviewer. Manuscript has benn improved.