Interaction between Trichoderma sp., Pseudomonas putida, and Two Organic Amendments on the Yield and Quality of Strawberries (Fragaria x annanasa cv. San Andreas) in the Huaral Region, Peru

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article “Interaction between Trichoderma sp., Pseudomonas sp., and organic amendments on strawberry (Fragaria x annanasa cv. San Andreas) yield and quality” authored by Huasasquiche et al. is devoted to description of the effects of two plant growth-promoting microorganisms and organic fertilizers on strawberry growth and yield. The value of the work lies in conducting a long-term field experiment under the same climatic conditions in which strawberries are grown in Peru. In general results looks good and valid. But there are several remarks that can improve the manuscript.

Major comments:

1. In the introduction, you can describe in more detail what microorganisms can be used to inoculate strawberries. And especially pay attention to those organisms that were used in the study: what are their advantages over others, what are their strengths and weaknesses.

2. The methods section does not indicate where the authors obtained Pseudomonas sp. and what strain was used.

Minor comments:

1. In many places in the text, especially in the discussion, the Latin names of microorganisms are not italicized.

2. L. 151, 174. Add dot after sp

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Editor and Authors, The article deals with the effect of Trichoderma sp. and Pseudomonas sp. in combination with two types of organic amendments on the yield and quality of strawberries (Fragaria x annanasa cv. San Andreas). Although the study presents interesting results, several aspects need to be reviewed to improve the quality and relevance of the conclusions drawn.
The title should be modified to include the location of the study, for example, "Interaction between Trichoderma sp., Pseudomonas sp. and 2 organic amendments on the yield and quality of strawberries (Fragaria x annanasa cv. San Andreas) in the Huaral region, Peru."
The article should be proofread by a native English speaker to correct grammatical and stylistic errors.
It is essential to conduct experiments over several growing seasons (2 successive years) in order to draw solid conclusions and have collosal results. Limiting the study to a single season calls into question the validity of the results by not accounting for seasonal and environmental variations.
The authors used a completely randomized block design (CRBD), whereas a split-plot design would have been more appropriate due to the two main factors studied (microbial inoculation and organic amendments). Furthermore, the presentation of the results does not reflect this interaction, which raises questions about the method of analysis used.
- The authors mention 12 combined treatments in the “Materials and Methods” section, but the results are presented separately for each factor. This makes it difficult to understand the analysis performed. It would be more appropriate to present the results as combined for each treatment.
- P-values should be added for all statistical analyses to determine the significance of the results. The article statistics need to be reviewed in full

- Some figures, particularly Figure 3, are of poor quality and unreadable. They should be improved to allow better interpretation of the data.
- The choice to measure the percentage of mortality during transplantation is questionable because of the many factors that can influence this parameter in the field. It would be better to choose parameters more directly related to the effects of microbial treatments and amendments.
- The use of curves instead of histograms in Figure 2 is not justified, because there is no temporal variation to show.

The conclusions drawn from the statistical results must be precise. When no significant difference is found, it is not appropriate to speak of a "trend" towards an increase.
- The abstract mentions an improvement in fruit density per square meter due to microbial inoculations, which is not correlated with the results presented in Figure 5. Only the combination of the two inoculants showed an increase, not the individual use of each inoculant.
Considering the points mentioned above, the article in its current state is not suitable for publication in a reputable journal such as Applied Microbiology. It requires a thorough revision in terms of experimentation, presentation and interpretation of results.   Comments on the Quality of English Language

The article should be proofread by a native English speaker to correct grammatical and stylistic errors.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript titled “Interaction between Trichoderma sp., Pseudomonas sp., and organic amendments on strawberry (Fragaria x annanasa cv. San Andreas) yield and quality” by Lucero Huasasquiche et al., reports the synergistic effect of fungal and bacterial inoculation influence and organic amendments application on strawberry yield and quality, as organic alternatives for sustainable plant growth and development. This is a well-written article and I anticipate that the manuscript should be of great interest to the researchers working on plant-microbe interactions and microbial plant biostimulants. I considered the manuscript suitable for publication subject to following improvements.

1.      It is suggested to revise the abstract by adding more information from the prominent results and remove the unnecessary information such as “Huaral Valley”, “comprising 12 treatments” etc. move these to materials and methods section.

2.      Line 53: revise the statement and add some statistical information “Fertilizer's excessive use has generated negative impacts on the environment which can lead to ecosystem degradation.”

3.      Revise the objectives part and the end of introduction section.

4.      In section 2.3; Line 113-114; Add ratio for Trichoderma and Pseudomonas. What was the ratio of these microbes?

5.      Line, 97, 98, 100, 111 and so on, 7.5 t∙ha-1, 1 dS∙m-1, 2.2 dS∙m-1, CFU∙mL-1, rectify by using upper case.

6.      The scientific names should be italicized throughout the manuscript.

7.      How did you inoculated the microbial culture? Foliar application or root zone application, add this information.

8.      It is suggested that the author should add information regarding the treatment. Do they apply the microbes at one time or they repeated?

9.      What was the length of experiment “total time” from treatment to end of experiment?

10.  Revise the statement Line 352-354 ‘Our results indicate that co-inoculation and compost addition have great potential to improve strawberry crop yield, as in the vast majority of our biometric parameters and yield components, both treatments showed the highest values’.

11.  Add more references from current literature and add some more details in the discussion section.

 12.  The article should become acceptable after minor revisions of English / grammatical mistakes.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

All my comments were corrected by the authors.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have made an effort to rectify some suggestions. Others such as the need to conduct experiments over several growing seasons (2 successive years) in order to draw solid conclusions and have colossal results was not possible due to budgetary reasons,

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Minor editing of English language required