Modeling Cultural Keystone Species for the Conservation of Biocultural Diversity in the Afroalpine

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

1. This is a very interesting piece of research which tries to link environmental sciences to biocultural diversity studies.

   The ecological part of the piece sounds well though, designed, executed - but much more is to be said in my humble opinion on the biocultural aspects:

   1. the concept of CKS has to be better clarified in the introductionThis is a very interesting piece of research which tries to link environmental sciences to biocultural diversity studies (introduction)
   2. How did authors assess that guassa grass as a CKS (introduction & methodology)?
   3. Can they provide some historical hints? or
   4. Could authors present at least some qualitative data sustaining it?
   5. Which are the exact and more CONCRETE implications of their findings for the sustainable management of this Afroalpine environment, i.e. which kind of strategies in terms of environmental management and community-centred initiatives should be envisioned also considering the ongoing dramatic CC? (Discussion)

Author Response

1. This is a very interesting piece of research which tries to link environmental sciences to biocultural diversity studies.

• Thank you very much for this perspective.

The ecological part of the piece sounds well though, designed, executed - but much more is to be said in my humble opinion on the biocultural aspects:

• Thank you very much for this observation. We have added  about biocultural species in the introduction.

1. the concept of CKS has to be better clarified in the introduction. This is a very interesting piece of research which tries to link environmental sciences to biocultural diversity studies (introduction)

• Again, thank you very much for bringing this to our attention. We have expanded upon the definition and importance of cultural keystone species (CKS) in the introduction, creating a new paragraph to focus on this concept in greater detail.

2. How did authors assess that guassa grass as a CKS (introduction & methodology)?

• Thank you for this important insight. We have expanded upon our original text to clarify how we determined that guassa grass is a CKS. Previous research in this area (Steger et al., 2020, 2021, 2022) revealed the central role that the grass plays in a) providing shelter and other valuable uses to humans, b) origin stories of their community and the conservation area establishment, and c) the definition of the Afroalpine landscape.  these are some of the proposed criteria for CKS. 

3. Can they provide some historical hints? or

• The communities around the guassa grass have been implementing a traditional conservation system for hundreds of years, known as the “QERO” system. It is an indigenous institution adopted by those communities that were influential in the area to manage and protect the common property resources of the guassa grass. The system was started in the 17^th century. The primary purpose to set the guassa area aside was for livestock grazing and use of the guassa (festuca) grass for making different household and agricultural materials. Under this system, an area has been protected from all types of interference for  3-4 years until the community elders allowed the people to cut the festuca grass for thatching, construct ropes, plaster walls, craft a wide variety of other cultural items and graze livestock.

4. Could authors present at least some qualitative data sustaining it?

• The ancient indigenous common property resource management system, although it was not designed to conserve the biodiversity of the ecosystem, it has enabled sustainable utilization, effective protection and fair distribution of biodiversity of the afroalpine ecosystem of the area for around 400 years. We have qualitative knowledge of declining guassa grass habitat from local ecological knowledge in the GCCA (Steger et al., 2020).

5. Which are the exact and more CONCRETE implications of their findings for the sustainable management of this Afroalpine environment, i.e. which kind of strategies in terms of environmental management and community-centred initiatives should be envisioned also considering the ongoing dramatic CC? (Discussion)

• We thank our reviewer for this important comment. Establishing a series of community-based conservation areas with strong peer-to-peer networks of communication and resource exchange is preferable for the sustainable management of this Afroalpine environment. Granting communities official land tenure plays a critical role, as people hesitate to spend time managing an area that might be taken away from them (Laperye, 2010; Steger et al., 2020). Meanwhile, community-based conservation that celebrates cultural knowledge and values has been shown to promote joint social and ecological benefits (Sheppard et al., 2010; Dyer et al., 2014). Effective community-based conservation areas require nested levels of governance that connect institutions both laterally and vertically (Ostrom et al., 2002).

 

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Editor, dear Authors,

I've completed my review of the manuscript entitled Modeling cultural keystone species for the conservation of biocultural diversity in the Afroalpine, authors Shambel Alemu Chengere1, Cara Steger2, Kflay Gebrehiwot3, Sileshi Nemomissa1 and Bikila Warkineh Dullo1

The authors present original results of their terrain work; in focus is conservation assessment of the Afroalpine grassland ecosystem that uses a cultural keystone species to drive  gis modeling and evaluate the potential distribution of this species in relation to current national and  community-based protected areas. The chorological very old endemic guassa grass (Festuca macrophylla) with his special ecology characteristic is very up to date thematic, authors presented this important subject on very interesting way connecting  few tematic such as botany, conservation grassland ecology, ethnoecology, biodiversity and protected areas in interesting interdisciplinary way.

In this study, authors compiled a dataset of 119 occurrence points from a range of sources, field visits, herbarium data and various other published sources. They have used 24 variables for predicting suitable habitats of guassa grass, and the software MaxEnt which is very good promising as a conservation planning and management tool when predicting suitable habitat for threatened, endemic, and endangered species.

The authors revealed a sharp distinction between wet and dry seasons appears to also be a critical ecological factor in suitable guassa grass habitat. They suggest  that guassa grass is more suited to higher slopes (above 15%), and to a mean diurnal range of roughly 12-15°C. They turned out to be a critical obstacle to collecting detailed demographic data and extensive habitat research is the lack of funds for basic vegetation monitoring. Results showed very limited areas and only four additional regions suitable habitat, for consideration as protected areas for conservation of endemic guassa grass. On the other hand, the authors critically evaluated other similar researches and conclude the guassa grass is a cultural keystone species for certain areas within the Amhara Regional State, they propose that building a network of community-based conservation areas with strong peer to peer learning, open communication, and resource sharing may facilitate the future protection of the bioculturally diverse Afroalpine.

Discussion is very well done, I congratulate to authors and I don’t have other comments on this part. I find the presented results here very important, because today we live in a society that is more aware of the need to conserve habitats and taxa biodiversity, especially endemic multi-purpose use Festuca macrophylla in Ethiopian Afroalpine grassland which is important even for their indentity ! Therefore, such background information should be published to become accessible for broader audience.
The paper is written very well; results are suitable for the publication in MDPI Environments. There are just a few little comments; in section 2. Methods, 2.4. Model selection I suggest moving a few sentences to the results section. In literature it is necessary to harmonize the writing of references. I marked these in the attached file.

I herewith recommend the reviewed manuscript for publication in the Environments MDPI.

SPECIFIC COMMENTS:
Specific comments are listed in the attached word file .

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

The authors present original results of their terrain work; in focus is conservation assessment of the Afroalpine grassland ecosystem that uses a cultural keystone species to drive  gis modeling and evaluate the potential distribution of this species in relation to current national and  community-based protected areas. The chorological very old endemic guassa grass (Festuca macrophylla) with his special ecology characteristic is very up to date thematic, authors presented this important subject on very interesting way connecting  few tematic such as botany, conservation grassland ecology, ethnoecology, biodiversity and protected areas in interesting interdisciplinary way.

• Thank you for these kind words.

In this study, authors compiled a dataset of 119 occurrence points from a range of sources, field visits, herbarium data and various other published sources. They have used 24 variables for predicting suitable habitats of guassa grass, and the software MaxEnt which is very good promising as a conservation planning and management tool when predicting suitable habitat for threatened, endemic, and endangered species.

The authors revealed a sharp distinction between wet and dry seasons appears to also be a critical ecological factor in suitable guassa grass habitat. They suggest  that guassa grass is more suited to higher slopes (above 15%), and to a mean diurnal range of roughly 12-15°C. They turned out to be a critical obstacle to collecting detailed demographic data and extensive habitat research is the lack of funds for basic vegetation monitoring. Results showed very limited areas and only four additional regions suitable habitat, for consideration as protected areas for conservation of endemic guassa grass. On the other hand, the authors critically evaluated other similar researches and conclude the guassa grass is a cultural keystone species for certain areas within the Amhara Regional State, they propose that building a network of community-based conservation areas with strong peer to peer learning, open communication, and resource sharing may facilitate the future protection of the bioculturally diverse Afroalpine.

Discussion is very well done, I congratulate to authors and I don’t have other comments on this part. I find the presented results here very important, because today we live in a society that is more aware of the need to conserve habitats and taxa biodiversity, especially endemic multi-purpose use Festuca macrophylla in Ethiopian Afroalpine grassland which is important even for their indentity ! Therefore, such background information should be published to become accessible for broader audience.
The paper is written very well; results are suitable for the publication in MDPI Environments. There are just a few little comments; in section 2. Methods, 2.4. Model selection I suggest moving a few sentences to the results section. In literature it is necessary to harmonize the writing of references. I marked these in the attached file.

• Thank you for these kind words. We have addressed your comments below.

1. in section 2. Methods, 2.4. Model selection I suggest moving a few sentences to the results section.

• Thank you very much for this suggestion.  After some consideration, we believe these details are best suited to the methods because they are critical to understanding the modeling process. Moreover, these sentences can better describe the method selection to better understand the findings stated in the result section.

2. In literature it is necessary to harmonize the writing of references. I marked these in the attached file.

• Thank you very much for suggesting harmonizing the references and your detailed review of our citations. We have corrected our references following your suggestions according to MDPI rules.    

Reviewer 3 Report

The present article is focused on modeling cultural keystone species for the conservation of biocultural diversity in the Afroalpine.

The abstract is well developed and keywords and properly selected.

In the Introduction section it should be mentioned the steps that are followed to reach the article objectives.

Methodology section is well developed, adequately described.

Results section is also very well developed.

The discussions section is obviously under-developed. The results of this article are not sufficiently discussed in relation with the article objectives. Also, this section should be better correlated with the previous ones.

I also recommend to check the MDPI rules regarding citations.

References sections should be also checked and corrected according to MDPI rules.

Overall, the article is well written and only a minor revision is required.

 

 

Author Response

The present article is focused on modeling cultural keystone species for the conservation of biocultural diversity in the Afroalpine.

• Thank you very much for this observation.

The abstract is well developed and keywords and properly selected.

• Thank you very much for this kind words

In the Introduction section it should be mentioned the steps that are followed to reach the article objectives.

• Thank you very much for this useful recommendation. We have added a few sentences to the introduction to clarify the article objectives and how they are addressed in the subsequent manuscript.

Methodology section is well developed, adequately described.

• Thank you for this observation

Results section is also very well developed.

• Again, thank you for this observation

The discussions section is obviously under-developed. The results of this article are not sufficiently discussed in relation with the article objectives. Also, this section should be better correlated with the previous ones.

• Thank you very much for this suggestion. We have added a paragraph at the beginning and at the end of the discussion which again summarizes the purpose of the paper and transitions into the more detailed discussion sections. We believe this additional paragraphs better correlates the discussion with the previous sections of the manuscript. We believe the discussion highlights the most important implications of our results for both scientific and conservation practitioner audiences.  

I also recommend to check the MDPI rules regarding citations.

• Thank you for this recommendation. We have corrected all the citations according to MDPI rules.

References sections should be also checked and corrected according to MDPI rules.

• Again, thank you very much for this recommendation. We have checked and corrected the references according to MDPI rules

Overall, the article is well written and only a minor revision is required.

• Thank you very much for these helpful observations.