Anti-Erosion Influences of Surface Roughness on Sloping Agricultural Land in the Loess Plateau, Northwest China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
There are two main points and a minor point that must be taken care of and resolved:
1- Plagiarism is high, more than 28%, and this is not acceptable in a respected journal such as Sustainability, so it must be reduced to less than 15%.
2- More than 70% of the references are outdated, so they must be updated to the last five years at most.
3- Writing references in the same style as the journal, which is numbering, not writing names.
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The topic is interesting having scientific and practical soundness as well.
I suggest to change the title to make it more relevant to the content.
Abstract is needed to be revised: change the evident statements to concrete ones supported by numbers.
The precise identification of the investigated region is essential.
I suggest to rename the terms of the treatments (artifical hoeing, digging) to make them more precise - or give references for the recent names.
The structure of the manuscript is very good, the content of the chapters is coherent.
The results are clearly described, the approach of analysing the interactions of the affecting factors is correct.
Figures 7a-7b must be improved.
Editing of the text is also needed.
Minor check of spelling is needed (especially the use of 'the'), I think.
I indicated my suggestions and remarks in sticky notes in the attached pdf file of the manuscript.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Title: « Anti-erosion influences of typical tillage on sloping farmland in Loess Plateau ».
As requested, I have reviewed the revised version of the above-titled paper for potential publication in the Sustainability - MDPI Journal. The topic of the article is very relevant for modern science in the field of anti-erosion influences of typical tillage.
The presented topic is interesting and well prepared in terms of organization and selection of literature. The authors focused on aspects anti-erosion influences of typical tillage on sloping farmland in Loess Plateau.
Figures 3 and 4, one legend should be made for all parts (3 parts) of one drawing. So the drawing will be clear and concise, without unnecessary details.
Fig. 5 and 6 it is necessary that the scale of values be the same for both the left and right parts of the figure. If figure 6 is a continuation of fig. 5, then, in my opinion, it is more correct to present in Figure 5 “runoff volume (Ry)” with a scale for OH from 3 to 120 Rainfall intensity/(mm h). In Figure 6, present "sediment yield (Sd)" with a scale for OX from 3 to 120 Rainfall intensity/(mm h).
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
The work is interesting and explained in a very detailed way. The authors clearly investigated the factors involved in the survey and they give detailed information about the complex analysis. Almost all sections are clear and well exposed, however I think that some improvements are needed in the manuscript.
Introduction
The subject matter is introduced in a way that need improvement and some more recent references integration (Marzen et al. 2017, Arshad et al. 2019, Liu et al. 2019).
Results
Section 3.1
The RR0 value and the RR0/RR become clear only in the fig. 3 capture. I think their meaning could be fixed at the beginning of section 3.1 to better understand this part of results.
Conclusions
I think that the anti-erosion influences of the typical tillage is not clear explained since in this section only the role of the three factors (rainfall intensity, slope gradient, and surface roughness) in promoting runoff and sediment is highlighted.
Figures 3 and 4: it is hard to distinguish between the symbols and between the bars of the graphs; please use colors or increase the graphs dimensions.
Figure 7: the lines of graphs are not clear; please increase graphs dimensions or use colors
Pg. 2 row 46: delete comma or adjust the sentence
Pg 10 row 205: before instead of before
Pg 14 row 267 and 284: the rows cut off and start in a new line
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have corrected what is required of them and I see that the manuscript is accepted in the current form.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
