Effects of Biopesticides and Undersown Cover Crops on Soil Properties in the Organic Farming System

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors Effects of biopesticides and undersown cover crops on soil properties in the organic farming system

I do have several suggestions that need to be addressed by major revision. Below are some specific comments to be taken into consideration by the authors:

General comments

-Investigation presents interesting and innovative data.

-The manuscript falls into the scope of the journal.

-The manuscript data are technically sound and support its conclusions.

-The introduction needs to be improved.  It should be improved by re-writing proper mechanistic background and justification of the study with relevant references according to the title. 

-The whole methodology must be written in the past tense and passive voice.

-The methodology of the experiment is very poorly written. The authors must rewrite adequately the whole methodology to allow reproduction of the estimated methods properly.

-Mention, the layout and design of the experiment in this chapter.

- Several grammatical and typos errors were observed throughout the MS. The whole MS should be checked properly by an English expert.  

-The language of the results chapter is too poor.

-The whole results must be written in the past tense.

-Conclusion must be rewritten with major findings, conclusive remarks, and recommendations according to the title and objectives of the study.

Specific comments

Abstract

Abstract is poor, this section should be written like;

-Short introduction of study

-Treatments

-Short results

-Short conclusion

Introduction

-The introduction needs to be improved.  It should be improved by re-writing proper mechanistic background and justification of the study with relevant references according to the title. 

Line 42: fertilisers….. actual word is fertilzers, check whole manuscript and correct it.

Materials and Methods

The whole methodology must be written in the past tense and passive voice.

The methodology of the experiment is very poorly written. The authors must rewrite adequately the whole methodology to allow reproduction of the estimated methods properly.

Mention, the layout and design of the experiment in this chapter.

Results

The language of the results chapter is too poor.

The whole results must be written in the past tense.

Discussion

The discussion should be rewritten with more interpretation of the results chronologically and a mechanistic explanation of the reason adequately.

-Write comprehensive discussion with more literature review and corelate with your study.

Conclusion

Rewrite the conclusion with major findings, conclusive remarks, and recommendations of the study.

Author Response

[2022-08-27]

 

Dear Reviewer:

We wish to submit an original research article for publication in Plant. We have made significant improvements to this article, titled “Effects of Biopesticides and Undersown Cover Crops on Soil Properties in the Organic Farming System”.

We would like to sincerely thank You for your insightful comments and recommendations that allowed us to fundamentally correct the article.

General comments

-Investigation presents interesting and innovative data.

-The manuscript falls into the scope of the journal.

-The manuscript data are technically sound and support its conclusions.

-The introduction needs to be improved.  It should be improved by re-writing proper mechanistic background and justification of the study with relevant references according to the title. 

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was rewritten.

-The whole methodology must be written in the past tense and passive voice.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. The methodology was changed to the past tense.

-The methodology of the experiment is very poorly written. The authors must rewrite adequately the whole methodology to allow reproduction of the estimated methods properly.

It was rewritten.

-Mention, the layout and design of the experiment in this chapter.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was added,

- Several grammatical and typos errors were observed throughout the MS. The whole MS should be checked properly by an English expert.  

-The language of the results chapter is too poor.

It was rewritten.

-The whole results must be written in the past tense.

The results chapter was changed to the past tense.

-Conclusion must be rewritten with major findings, conclusive remarks, and recommendations according to the title and objectives of the study.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was rewritten.

We reviewed and clarified the manuscript. Thank you for your consideration.

 

Sincerely,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

this paper had studied the effects of biopesticides and undersown cover crops on soil properties in the organic farming system, the results showed that The undersown cover crops did not significantly affect or even significantly reduced the number and biomass of earthworms (perennial ryegrass) in the soil compared to the plots without cover crops. The abundance of earthworms in the soil was more influenced by meteorological conditions. The inclusion of undersown cover crops in crop rotations and the use of biopesticides are essential for the long-term sustainability of the agroecosystem in organic farming. These results are useful to know organic farm, but still have some to be improved as follows:

1.Biopesticides in this paper are Recharge and Fizimite which is bacteria and fungus and some trace elements,such nutrient is not enough to support plant growth. Is it possible to prevent pest and disease?

2. General experimental conditions part no N content in soil, if possilbe please supplement, 2020and 2022 may change to 2020 and 2021;

3.soil properties including physical property, chemical property and microbe property, but this paper only study some characteristic such as soil shear strength,soil aggregate. the results has the soil aggregate after treatment, but no soil aggregate before treatement, this is not easy to compare;

4.the plant root dry biomass and earthworms are not soil property, and the number of earthworms in different year much different, the result can not give right explanation.  

Author Response

[2022-08-27]

 

Dear Reviewer:

We wish to submit an original research article for publication in Plant. We have made significant improvements to this article, titled “Effects of Biopesticides and Undersown Cover Crops on Soil Properties in the Organic Farming System”.

We would like to sincerely thank You for your insightful comments and recommendations that allowed us to fundamentally correct the article.

1.Biopesticides in this paper are Recharge and Fizimite which is bacteria and fungus and some trace elements,such nutrient is not enough to support plant growth. Is it possible to prevent pest and disease?

We did not investigate the effects of Recharge and Fizimite on pests and diseases in this experiment. We will definitely include this in our research in the future.

2. General experimental conditions part no N content in soil, if possilbe please supplement, 2020and 2022 may change to 2020 and 2021;

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was changed.

3.soil properties including physical property, chemical property and microbe property, but this paper only study some characteristic such as soil shear strength,soil aggregate. the results has the soil aggregate after treatment, but no soil aggregate before treatement, this is not easy to compare;

4.the plant root dry biomass and earthworms are not soil property, and the number of earthworms in different year much different, the result can not give right explanation. 

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. 3 and 4 comments were taken to consideration and it was rewritten to be more clear.

 

We reviewed and clarified the manuscript. Thank you for your consideration.

 

Sincerely,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Please see my comments on the review paper itself. Overall I did not see much of a scientific approach in your writing. This can be improved a lot. English language corrections with regards to tense usage and long sentences should be improved. The research findings and discussion can be written more clearly using small and simple sentences. The significance of this research is not emphatically presented anywhere, therefore it does not excite the reader to read more.

The introduction is very general and seems like it's just picked directly from various papers. It didn't connect to your research context very well.

The Statistics section is poorly written. Results section has some good findings but not well presented with clarity. The discussion section should be related to your findings rather than simply citing other papers.

Please do the needful.

Thanks 

 

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

[2022-08-27]

 

Dear Reviewer:

We wish to submit an original research article for publication in Plant. We have made significant improvements to this article, titled “Effects of Biopesticides and Undersown Cover Crops on Soil Properties in the Organic Farming System”.

We would like to sincerely thank You for your insightful comments and recommendations that allowed us to fundamentally correct the article.

Please see my comments on the review paper itself. Overall I did not see much of a scientific approach in your writing. This can be improved a lot. English language corrections with regards to tense usage and long sentences should be improved. The research findings and discussion can be written more clearly using small and simple sentences. The significance of this research is not emphatically presented anywhere, therefore it does not excite the reader to read more.

The introduction is very general and seems like it's just picked directly from various papers. It didn't connect to your research context very well.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was reviewed and rewritten.

The Statistics section is poorly written. Results section has some good findings but not well presented with clarity. The discussion section should be related to your findings rather than simply citing other papers.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. We added more information. We took your comments into consideration and rewrote the parts of the article that you recommended.

 

We reviewed and clarified the manuscript. Thank you for your consideration.

 

Sincerely,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 4 Report

Dear Author(s),

I have gone through your manuscript. No doubt it's nice piece of work. However, you failed to keep the beauty of english and the style of the manuscript. Please read the manuscript by an english expert during revision. My specific comments are given below:

 

L15-19, P1: Not clear. Probably something is missing. Please revise the sentences.

L26-31:  Not clear. The L28-29 doesn't match with the last sentence i.e. concluding sentence. Please revise.

L95, P2: Please delete the phrase ''under the condition of''

L110-117, P3: Why  each species has different rates, e.g., 10 kg ha^-1, 50 kg ha^-1

L179, P5: Not clear. Please revise

L375-76, P11: Please merge the sentece with previous one.

 

Thank you,

Author Response

[2022-08-27]

 

Dear Reviewer:

We wish to submit an original research article for publication in Plant. We have made significant improvements to this article, titled “Effects of Biopesticides and Undersown Cover Crops on Soil Properties in the Organic Farming System”.

We would like to sincerely thank You for your insightful comments and recommendations that allowed us to fundamentally correct the article.

L15-19, P1: Not clear. Probably something is missing. Please revise the sentences.

L26-31:  Not clear. The L28-29 doesn't match with the last sentence i.e. concluding sentence. Please revise.

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. It was rewritten.

L95, P2: Please delete the phrase ''under the condition of''

It was deleted and all paragraph rewritten.

L110-117, P3: Why  each species has different rates, e.g., 10 kg ha-1, 50 kg ha-1

The different seed rates were applied because different mixtures of plants with different growth characteristics were sown. It was recommended to sow at such rates.

L179, P5: Not clear. Please revise

We thank the Reviewer for the comment. We added more information.

L375-76, P11: Please merge the sentece with previous one.

We reviewed and clarified the manuscript. Thank you for your consideration.

 

Sincerely,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

No

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

We would like to sincerely thank You for your comments and recommendations that allowed us to correct the article. We really appreciate it.

Best wishes,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt

Reviewer 4 Report

I am satisfied on the response of authors. Now the manuscript could be accepted if other reviewers satisfied. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

We would like to sincerely thank You for your comments and recommendations that allowed us to correct the article. We really appreciate it.

Best wishes,

Aušra Marcinkevičienė

Vytautas Magnus University, K. Donelaičio str. 58, 44248 Kaunas, Lithuania

[+37061533187]

ausra.marcinkeviciene@vdu.lt