Propane Flaming as a New Approach to Control Mediterranean Invasive Weeds

Round  1

Reviewer 1 Report

I believe that the paper presents minimal new information.  Flaming is only partially effective for control of perennial weeds.  Repeat treatments are always needed. 

Author Response

Reviewer #1

I believe that the paper presents minimal new information.  Flaming is only partially effective for control of perennial weeds.  Repeat treatments are always needed. 

Indeed, flaming is not a new practice for weed control, and evaluating the efficacy of this method on various weed species was also published before. However, as indicate in the Introduction, we believe that our study presents new results and has novelty in several aspects:

1.     We used various weed control parameters rather than above ground biomass, to evaluate the effect of flaming. To the best of our knowledge, there are no other studies relates to the impact of flaming on seed\flower production and on tuber\rhizome development. This new information is highly important for future weed research. It provides deeper insight into the control of these weeds by flaming, and can contribute to the long-term management of invasive and perennial weeds.

2.     Some of the tested species, mainly Cyperus rotundus and Sorghum halepense, are of great interest to the agronomic community. These weeds are highly invasive and pose a great threat on agro-ecosystems in many areas. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that evaluates the potential use of flaming to control these weeds. Results present here can be useful for many cropping systems in many areas worldwide.

3.     Lastly, this is one of the first studies to evaluate the efficacy of propane flaming on native Mediterranean weed species. So far, most studies were conducted in North America, Canada and North Europe. Our study focused on semi-arid conditions, and therefore add novel information relevant for future climate changes.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Very cool (or should I say hot, pun intended) study. Spell check and punctuation need to be checked throughout, I found a lot of mistakes (I only highlighted 2 or 3). Methods need some clarification and reworking. My biggest issue is the two flaming types were conducted on different species and essentially two completely different studies and objectives are in one paper - the authors appear to want to compare them when that isn't possible. there needs to be a clearer separation between the trials and justification for why the trials were set up this way.

line 12 - 'affect'

line 14 - local weeds? unclear what you mean by this - native? if so, just say weeds - reclassify into broadleaves and grasses

line 15 - single dose what? remove second part of sentence

line 18 - is does the right word here? do you mean application? check the literature

line 22 - reword

line 36 'at' not 'by'

line 37'...environment, such as...'

line 38 - 'approaches'

line 41 - I disagree. I think that this 'trend' is due to the need to conserve what herbicide MOAs are still viable and the need to not so heavily rely upon them.

line 44 - where? which cropping systems?

line 59 - reword

line 60 - give specifics on the studies

line 64 - local Mediterranean crops?

line 66 - johnsongrass

line 69 - and annual weeds? aren't they all weeds?

line 70 - remove from intro

line 74 - think of a more scientific sounding subheading

line 75 - seeds were collected from where and when?

swap annual and perennial sections

line 90 - contradicts previous sentence - clarify

line 108 - why those dates? only 2 growth stages?

why were the application methods not tested on all weeds? and why were not all objectives tested across all species?

how would this effect the crop? how close to the crop can you get?

line 147 - early and late? what precise stages?  dry weight of above or below ground biomass?

Table 1. no need to show main effects if the interaction is significant

S1 - should be table in text

S2 - awesome photo,  but not sure it is necessary - also no PPE is apparent

Author Response

Reviewer #2

Thanks for your useful comments and suggestions. We have revised the text according to the comments.  We have responded to all of your questions and revised the document accordingly. As suggested, the manuscript was undergone professional English editing. We feel that the manuscript was significantly improved.  Please find a revised version of our manuscript. Line numbering in our response relates to the Word document.

 General comments:

1.      Spell check and punctuation need to be checked throughout, I found a lot of mistakes (I only highlighted 2 or 3).

The manuscript was revised and undergone professional English editing.

2.      Methods need some clarification and reworking.

The methods section was revised and more information was added to provide the most comprehensive detailing of our methodology.

3.      My biggest issue is the two flaming types were conducted on different species and essentially two completely different studies and objectives are in one paper - the authors appear to want to compare them when that isn't possible. there needs to be a clearer separation between the trials and justification for why the trials were set up this way.

The reason for evaluating two different flaming methods on different weed species was stated in the manuscript (127-131). We revised the text to clarify this aspect, and added more details to the text. Indeed, a comparison between the two methods is not possible, however, this aspect was not one of our objectives.

Specific comments:

1.      line 12 - 'affect'

This word was changed to "reshaped" during editing (line 18).

line 14 - local weeds? unclear what you mean by this - native? if so, just say The sentence was revised as suggested. Weeds - reclassify into broadleaves and grasses (line 20).

2.      line 15 - single dose what? remove second part of sentence

The sentence was revised and the second part of the sentence was removed (line 22).

3.      line 18 - is does the right word here? do you mean application? check the literature

We checked the literature and the terminology 'dose' is correct to describe propane rates.

4.      line 22 – reword

The sentence was revised accordingly (lines 29-30).

5.      line 36 'at' not 'by'

Corrected (line 46).

6.      line 37'...environment, such as...'

Corrected (line 47).

7.      line 38 - 'approaches'

Changed to "tool" (line 48).

8.      line 41 - I disagree. I think that this 'trend' is due to the need to conserve what herbicide MOAs are still viable and the need to not so heavily rely upon them.

The sentence was revised as suggested (line 51-54).

9.      line 44 - where? which cropping systems?

The sentence was revised and some examples for cropping systems were added (lines 57-58).

10.  line 59 – reword

The sentence was revised (line 75).

11.  line 60 - give specifics on the studies

As suggested, more details were added about these experiments (lines 76-82).

12.  line 64 - local Mediterranean crops?

We revised this sentence (line 85).

13.  line 66 – johnsongrass

Corrected (line 87).

14.  line 69 - and annual weeds? aren't they all weeds?

We revised the text as suggested (89-92).

15.  line 70 - remove from intro

As requested, the sentence was removed.

16.  line 74 - think of a more scientific sounding subheading

The subheading was revised (line 95) as observed in other papers in this journal (e.g., Agronomy 2018, 8, 140; doi:10.3390/agronomy8080140).

17.  line 75 - seeds were collected from where and when?

We revised the text and added the relevant information as suggested (lines 96-99).

18.  swap annual and perennial sections

Swapped as suggested.

19.  line 90 - contradicts previous sentence – clarify

The sentence was revised to avoid confusion (lines 116-117).

20.  line 108 - why those dates? only 2 growth stages?

The reasons for the specific application dates were spelled out (lines 143-147). Additionally, the reason for the first timing after 23 days is mentioning the section 2.2 (lines 153-154). Indeed, only two growth stages were tested. We believe that these two timings are the most relevant for actual field application.

21.  why were the application methods not tested on all weeds? and why were not all objectives tested across all species?

We revised the text and added information as for the reason for the different setup for annual and perennial weeds in the method section (lines 127-131).

22.  how would this effect the crop? how close to the crop can you get?

Indeed, flaming treatments have a great impact on the crop that must be taken into consideration. However, this aspect was not within the scope of this study and for that reason was not addressed. Previous studies showed that this method can be safe for crops such as onion, corn, soybean and vineyards.

23.  line 147 - early and late? what precise stages?  dry weight of above or below ground biomass?

The exact timings are mentioned in the text, 23 and 33 days after planting. The fact that it is above ground biomass was added throughout the paper at the relevant places.

24.  Table 1. no need to show main effects if the interaction is significant

The table was revised as suggested.

25.  S1 - should be table in text

Table S1 was inserted into the text as Table 1.

26.  S2 - awesome photo,  but not sure it is necessary - also no PPE is apparent

The photo was omitted as suggested.

 Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The research is relevant but the methodology and results in particular need to be more clearly explained. The tables and figures are fairly clear to understand and the discussion around the results is okay. The paper suffers from poor sentence structure in several sections and there are many spelling errors. Needs significant editing to make it clearer and more succinct.

Author Response

Reviewer #3

Thanks for your useful comments and suggestions. We have revised the text according to the comments.  We have responded to all of your questions and revised the document accordingly. As suggested the manuscript was undergone professional English editing. We feel that the manuscript was significantly improved.  Please find a revised version of our manuscript.

General comments:

1.        The research is relevant but the methodology and results in particular need to be more clearly explained.

We have revised the methods section to add more information on the experiments and the results section was improved to be clearer.

2.        The tables and figures are fairly clear to understand and the discussion around the results is okay.

Thank you!

3.        The paper suffers from poor sentence structure in several sections and there are many spelling errors. Needs significant editing to make it clearer and more succinct.

As suggested, we have revised the manuscript to improve the text, and also sent it to professional scientific English editor.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round  2

Reviewer 1 Report

Paper has been improved.  There are still some misspellings and grammar mistakes. 

Author Response

Misspellings and grammar mistakes were checked through the manuscript and corrected.

Reviewer 3 Report

The authors have made marked improvements to the manuscript by removing the grammatical/spelling errors and providing more detail, particularly in the methods section.

A couple of small suggestions are:

When you start a sentence with a scientific name you should write the full genus name. Some examples where this has not been done are lines 106, 156, 199, 217, 234 and 239.

In line 50 should be management and not managements.

In line 52 suggest resistant instead of resistance.

In line 59 suggest associated instead of associate.

In line 73 suggest techniques instead of technique.

In line 127 remove that

Author Response

Reviewer #3

Thanks for your useful comments and suggestions.  We have revised the text accordingly.   Please find a point-by-point response to your comments.

1.      When you start a sentence with a scientific name you should write the full genus name. Some examples where this has not been done are lines 106, 156, 199, 217, 234 and 239.

Scientific names were edited as suggested through the paper.

2.      In line 50 should be management and not managements.

Corrected (line 50).

3.      In line 52 suggest resistant instead of resistance.

Corrected (line 52).

4.      In line 59 suggest associated instead of associate.

Corrected (line 59).

5.      In line 73 suggest techniques instead of technique.

Corrected (line 73).

6.      In line 127 remove that

As suggested, "that" was removed.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx