Plant Community and Soil Properties Regulate Space-Scale Dependence of Species Diversity under Grazing Exclusion and Rest Grazing in the Qilian Mountains of China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

General comments

This work focuses on the comparison of degraded grassland restoration modalities. Authors have measured some biodiversity indices to compare two fundamental modalities of grazing Grazing exclusion (GE) and rest grazing (RG). The outputs of this work are suggested to be very useful, since degraded rangeland becomes a universal problem and successful restoration ways are very needed.

First of all, I would like to thank the researchers for the effort they put in to accomplish this vast fieldwork. Really, field researchers are decreasing nowadays.

I come back now for the article, which is well structured and well written, just to add some comments that can improve the article.

• The title is difficult to understand, I propose to simplify and reduce title such as “Effect of two pathways of grazing management, exclusion and rest grazing, on species diversity, plant communities and soil proprieties, in the Qilian Mountains of China”. Of course you can choice other title.
• In the abstract, the last sentence is too long and ambiguous, I propose to split-it into two sentences such as: Most of the community and soil variables at each scale had positive effects on species diversity. However, a negative correlation was seen between biodiversity and species coverage, mean plant height, soil porosity (SK), and bulk density (BD) under the two contrasting grazing management.
• In section (2.2. Experimental design; lines 6-8) you have reported “Five grazing management types were selected, including three GE types and two RG types. GE types included 10 -month, 4- year and a long-term (more than 20 years) grazing exclusion”. In the table you have only four type and not five, also four GE types and not three. Please give more explanation, I have some ambiguities!
• Table 1: Readers confront some difficulties in distinguishing between GE and RG grasslands. Grazing in the non-growing seasons, is it a type of RG?
• In the conclusion      section: you have reported this paragraph that I propose to split it into two sentences. Our findings suggest that community structure characteristics, species diversity indices and soil nutrition variables under rest grazing were relatively higher than under grazing exclusion. However, Pielou index, biomass, soil bulk density and mean plant eight were more imposed in grazing exclusion management. The application of each of strategies depends on the status of the degraded rangeland.

I have also reported some interpretations in PDF file.

In conclusion:

 

In conclusion, this research appears to be well-founded and the comparison between different strategies of rangeland grazing provides very useful experiences in the way of rangeland and ecology restoration. However, sometimes I get lost in the interpretations and comparisons because you are comparing several factors, parameters, and study sites at the same time. To follow the interpretation of the results, the reader must pay close attention. Fortunately, you have a well-written conclusion that allows for a more straightforward interpretation. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

I am not a native speaker, however, I think a minor English revision, especially in sentence structures, is recommended. 

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the constructive comments and suggestions on revising our manuscript. We have considered all the comments and suggestions carefully in revising the manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 Dear Editor,

I have read the manuscript “Vegetation community and soil characteristics of grassland regulates space-scale dependence of species diversity under different grazing management in the Qilian Mountains of China” (agriculture-2596403) with interest and found that authors have concluded very good outcome from the current study and carefully wrote it to be free of errors. Although, minor revision for fixing grammatical errors and English improvements is still needed to present the manuscript in a more attractive manner, which should be addressed before the paper is considered for publication:

·         Kindly give the strong hypothesis and background information in the abstract with supporting data emphasizing major findings from the study based on which results were concluded.

·         In discussion, before discussing the significant findings, highlight those findings very preciously and consequently discuss that result; follow throughout the discussion.  

·         In the conclusion section, give the major significant findings, a recap of the draft and at last recommendations for further research, developers, policy makers, industrialists etc.

 

·         Reference section is a must to check, in many places there are collapsing of wordings that have to be removed

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the constructive comments and suggestions on revising our manuscript. We have considered all the comments and suggestions carefully in revising the manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript is interesting, but minor revisions are necessary to be accepted for publication. Comments were done in the manuscript.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the constructive comments and suggestions on revising our manuscript. We have considered all the comments and suggestions carefully in revising the manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I have carefully reviewed ms. 'Vegetation and soil community characteristics in grasslands regulate the spatial-scale dependence of species diversity under different grazing management conditions in the Qilian Mountains of China' by Liu et al. Exclusion grazing (EG) and rotational grazing (RG) are essential for restoring grassland ecosystems. This study in the Qilian Mountains found that RG significantly increases species richness and diversity compared to GE at a regional scale. 

Although the topic is well chosen and relevant, as well, it is not very well presented.

 Introduction: Although this section introduces us to the topic studied, not enough data is provided. At the same time, previous studies are too widely debated. 

Materials and Methods: The study sites is well done but lacks a map. 

It is not very clear to me where the list of species is presented. Has it already been published? The authors state that the surveys were done in 2019 but the bibliographic reference is from 1995.

Results: This section does not stand out at all. The results are not adequately presented. The Shannon-Wiener and Simpson index plots could be put together. Then there should be other graphs that better illustrate the results. The tables do indeed contain important data but are difficult to follow.

Discussion: The authors claim that 'existing research results have shown that the effects of different types of grazing management on species diversity have been controversial (i.e. increasing, decreasing or not significant)', but they do not even give a literature reference. There should be at least three literature references, one for each of the results. Otherwise, this statement does not seem valid.

The paragraph on taller plants in grassland should be moved to the previous section because, as the authors point out, these are results.

Otherwise, this section is well written with perhaps too much detail.

Also, the conclusions should be a little more succinct but the authors have accomplished their planned aims. 

 

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for the constructive comments and suggestions on revising our manuscript. We have considered all the comments and suggestions carefully in revising the manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Introduction: Paragraphs have been added in this section so the requirements are currently met.

Materials and Methods:I also noticed that a map has been added.

It is not specified, although I asked for it, a reference by which plant species were identified. And again, where is the list of plants?

It is very good that the two indices Shannon-Wiener and Simpson are on the same graph.

Unfortunately, I can't find any other graphs, only tables that are quite hard to follow.

Discussion: I notice that the required references have been added

It is very good that the two indices Shannon-Wiener and Simpson are on the same graph.

I note the addition of the required references.

However, the paragraph listing plant species was not moved.

Conclusions are well written.

Author Response

Point-by-point response to reviewers’ comments

(ID: agriculture-2596403)

• It is not specified, although I asked for it, a reference by which plant species were identified. And again, where is the list of plants?

Reply: Thanks for the suggestions. We added references by which plant species were identified as suggested in the revised version. At the same time, we added the list of plants in Table 1 in the “Supplementary Materials” in the revised version.

• Unfortunately, I can't find any other graphs, only tables that are quite hard to follow.

Reply: Thanks. We added 7 figures (60 graphs) as suggested in the revised version. In addition, we didn’t change “Table 2” to figure which will appear very monotonous because many variables cannot merge with each other.

• However, the paragraph listing plant species was not moved.

Reply: Thanks for the suggestions. We removed the paragraph listing plant species as suggested in the revised version.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf