Captive Management and Reproduction of the Rio Pescado Stubfoot Toad (Atelopus balios)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

See attached document.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

See attached document.

Author Response

Hello, Chris Buttermore here.  I wanted to thank you for your critical eye in cleaning up this article.  I was able to go through and make many of the adjustments you suggested.  I based this report off of the format of some of the other descriptions of captive propagation of Atelopus which makes it an atypical format but I think that its important that the info is laid out in a way that is helpful for the people who are using this manual to care for this species.  Additionally, while I don't go into the genetic hurdles with captive propagation, it is brought up here to encourage the tracking of individual lineage in their populations.  This actually proved very helpful for a keeper that I sent this manual to when I first wrote it who is now in the F3 generation.  Although these individuals will not be used in direct conservation efforts, it is a good practice.  Besides those things, I found your notes very helpful.  Hopefully I can always get someone with your eye to peer review my submissions.  Be safe, and thank you.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you very much for the manuscript, it is very interesting and contains very important information.

I reviewed a manuscript that reviews the work done by a group of researchers regarding the maintenance of a group of amphibians in captivity and their reproductive success; it is not original research. If JZBG requires it to be evaluated as an original research or an experimental study it is not correct.    The authors must verify that all figures are cited in the text and in the correct position; the absence of citations for several of the figures was identified.   Once in the opinion, the manuscript is well written and complies with the precise description of a process and its results, which does not imply that a statistical analysis has been carried out to verify causality or correlation.   My specific comments to the authors are as follows:

• This manuscript addresses the captive maintenance conditions in which a collection of Atelopus balios has been kept and the impact on its reproduction, which represents an original contribution to the conservation and reproduction of endangered amphibian species. This is a precise description of the conditions in which these animals have been kept and the reproductive successes, without establishing a causal association or statistical correlation.
• There is no other study that mentions these conditions in the species, which is why it is of relevance to the scientific community.
• As this is a review, in the methodology the authors detail the shelter and feeding conditions that are carried out day by day, there are no experimental trials so no controls are described.
• The conclusions are consistent with the arguments presented throughout the text.
• References are appropriate and used accurately.
• Authors are requested to take special care to reference the figures in the text, some of them could not be found between the paragraphs.

Author Response

Thank you very much! I have cleaned up the manual a little bit so hopefully it can be published to help out people working with Atelopus pretty soon!

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thanks for the adjustments to the manuscript.

Author Response

All suggestions are taken care of.