Pedogenic Processes in a Posidonia oceanica Mat

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Interesting contribution. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

The first reviewer had pointed out a number of typo mistakes in our manuscript that we have corrected in the new version of the manuscript. Furthermore, he/she has noticed that the species name Posidonia oceanica was not in italics in the bibliography, and we have corrected these as well as other scientific names (see tracked changes in the new version of the manuscript). We are thankful for the careful work of reviewer 1 and its attention to detail.

Reviewer 2 Report

General comment

This paper is the first (to my knowledge) which discusses the pedogenic processes in seagrass substrate and if it should be classified as soil or sediment (which is the current definition). I think this is of great value and interest for seagrass research, especially in light of the hot topics of blue carbon and paleao-archives. However, I think the authors needs to better specify why this is of importance (I only find one sentence in the introduction highlighting this) and how it can be used in more practical terms. I also think another improvement would be the data presentation in terms of figures and to reorganize and rewrite some of the discussion. See specific comments below.

Introduction

Lines 34-36: Please rephrase. There are a lot of “and” in this sentence.

Lines 43-44: Is it correct that Posidonia always have the potential to alter the substrate or could it be connected to specific environmental conditions? This sentence needs some nuance.

Lines 51-52: Please move the “also” to before “have”. 

Method:

Lines 97-98: Please write the full names for the elements for us none-chemists.

Results

Figure 2: Please consider some space between the figures so the values on the x-axis are easier to read.

Figure 4: I understand why this is made into a table but could the the two first components (which explains the most) not be presented in a PCA-plot in order to make it easier for the reader to interpret the results?

Discussion

Although this study focuses on P. oceanica it would be interesting to briefly discuss other seagrass species and if they have a potential to create soil as well. I think this will open up for a more general discussion and further studies on potential seagrass soil formation.

Lines 168-169: If there are any photos showing the cores this would be interesting to show.

Lines 165-175: The first paragraph of the discussion could be better used to highlight the main findings of the study. The end of the paragraph doesn’t seem to lead to anything either.

Lines 187-189: But OM was not correlated to PC1 and here you say that OM belongs to both COM and FOM? It also says SOM on line 190.

Lines 225-226: Please use the word “substrate” instead of “soil”.

Lines 290-292: Is this not a little too hypothetical? It could be all silt too. Please explain better or remove.

Line 311: “Shallower” is misspelled.

Lines 312-320: This is very interesting and should be moved to the result instead. It can be presented as a figure together with the other depth graphs in figure 2.

Conclusion: The first paragraph of the conclusion could be the first paragraph of the discussion as it summarizes your main findings and the conclusion could instead focus more on the interpretation of the main findings and what they mean in a bigger picture.

Although I respect and fully agree on the intrinsic value of defining things for what they are (soil or sediment) but it would be interesting to discuss what and how this classification could be used for in more detail and in terms of more practical issues. Could it e.g. provide with information for management or could it be used in restauration? This could also be emphasized in the aim and abstract as well.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf