Long-Term Spatiotemporal Variability of Whitings in Lake Geneva from Multispectral Remote Sensing and Machine Learning

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors,

It’s an interesting toptic to research the whiting events using remote sensing data and machine learning method.

Some advices:

1. About the paragraph from line 86 to 94, except expressing the main aim of the paper, main contribution or main novelty should also be expressed clearly in this paragraph.

2. About section 6. Discussion and conclusions

Discussion and conclusions mixed together, it seems hard to find where are the conclusions. It’s suggested that, in each paragraph for conclusion, give a conclusive statement first, then explain the conclusion, or discuss it further.

For example, line480-493, only after finish reading the whole paragraph, reader can find out where is the conclusion. A conclusive sentence first may make the paragraph more readable.

Best Regards.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

This paper introduces a study on the whiting events in lake waters, which are massive calcite precipitation events turning hardwater lake waters to a milky turquoise color. The study applied a multispectral remote sensing approach to describe the spatial and temporal occurrences of whitings in Lake Geneva from 2013 to 2021. In the study, Landsat-8, Sentinel-2, and Sentinel-3 sensors data are combined to derive the AreaBGR index and identify whitings using appropriate filters. Their results show that 95% of the detected whitings are located in the northeastern part of the lake and occur in a highly reproducible environmental setting. The study also indicated that extended time series of whitings in the last 60 years is reconstructed from a random forest algorithm and analyzed through a Bayesian decomposition for annual and seasonal trends. The annual number of whiting days between 1958 and 2021 does not follow any particular monotonic trend. The inter-annual changes of whiting occurrences significantly correlate to the Western Mediterranean Oscillation Index. Spring whitings have increased since 2000 and significantly follow the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation index. Future climate change in the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean could induce more variable and earlier whiting events in Lake Geneva. The study can provide a reference for similar water quality issues such as calcite precipitation events.

However, there are some points to be improved before accepted.

1) Line 34-39, the citation should be followed with the instruction of the journal. For example, "Whiting events are common phenomena of marine environments (Sondi and Juracic, 2010; Larson and Mylroie, 2014; Shanableh et al., 2019; 2021) and lakes (Strong and Eadie, 1978; Effler, 1987; Thompson et al., 1997; Nouchi et al., 2019). Whitings are characterized by a milky turquoise coloration of upper surface layers, generated by a fine-grained size of calcite precipitates that increase the turbidity of the water column and its light reflectance (Peng and Effler, 2017)." should be changes into "[1], [2-5]".

2) Figures 1, 2 and 3 need to add the scale, North orientation, and legend.

3) Discussion and conclusion should be separated into two sections.

4) References are fine.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The revised version has been greatly improved to meet the requirement of the journal to be accepted for publication.