Chemical Stoichiometry and Enzyme Activity Changes during Mixed Decomposition of Camellia sinensis Pruning Residues and Companion Tree Species Litter

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you very much. We have responded to each of your suggestions.Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors,

 

Your manuscript is a valuable scrupulous multifaceted contribution with a high scientific output. The study of enzyme activity changes is an important issue.

I propose you to give some explanations and make a few corrections. The details are presented herewith below.

 

 

Major comments

 

Your point of view on a tea garden purpose differs from the generally accepted understanding.

 

The litter decomposition is an important natural process. This process is related to an organic matter mineralization rate (www.mdpi.com/1999-4907/7/10/231), which provides nutrient’s return. C release to atmosphere is high.

 

Your experimental scheme with bags reduces an organic matter decomposition rate. The rate could be much higher if the organic matter would be mixed with the soil.

 

To accelerate decomposition, the organic matter gasification is proposed (http://www1.fips.ru/ofpstorage/Doc/IZPM/RUNWC1/000/000/002/692/718/%D0%98%D0%97-02692718-00001/document.pdf; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12112765). The syngas is then used for the energy and chemical synthesis. The gasification dispersed byproduct should be applied via intra-soil milling as a plant nutrition agent. In this case, you are capable do not alter the rhizosphere equilibria with excess organic matter.

 

The major comment we gave were made not to reject the paper. This is only a proposition to the authors to reflect new technology in the manuscript and to try to promote it in the future.

  

 

Minor comments

 

Lines 117-120

Why did you choose P. massoniana, C. lanceolata, C. glanduliferum, and B. luminifera as a litter source? What was the basis for choosing a mixed treatment 1:1 ratio?

 

Lines 120-121

The litter was brought back to the laboratory and dried to a constant weight.

For what purpose did you dry the litter? After that, you placed the bags to the soil and the samples humidity turned out according to local environment.

 

Table 1

There is no need for “/” in the “Litter type” row.

Note: Different letters in the same column indicate significant differences in the data (p<0.05).

What level does each letter indicate?

 

Line 162

The data were statistically analyzed using SPSS 22.0 software…

In the Table 3, a correlation between the stoichiometric characteristics of litter and enzyme activity was mostly insignificant. This is typical for a frontal statistical procedure. It should be useful to highlight the valuable data.

Author Response

Thank you very much. We have responded to each of your suggestions.Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

There are some questions. These questions are in the attached file.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you very much. We have responded to each of your suggestions.Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf