Supplementing Nitrogen in Combination with Rhizobium Inoculation and Soil Mulch in Peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.) Production System: Part I. Effects on Productivity, Soil Moisture, and Nutrient Dynamics

Comments: Abstract, Results are too general, need to specify (mention) the results.

Authors’ response: We thank the reviewer for these suggestions. We have revised the abstract, particularly lines 44-47 based on these valuable suggestions.

Comments:Introduction: Need to improve the write-up and develop sequence among the paragraphs

Authors’ response: We have improved the flow of the introduction by rearranging paragraphs (e.g. lines82-98) and strengthened the summary of our research investigations lines (129-136)

Comments: Fertilizer application; what are the basis of selection of these fertilizer levels like 75% and others. How recommended fertilizers were decided on which basis?

Authors’ response: We performed an extensive literature search before deciding experimental details such as the fertilizer dose rates. One of the prime objectives of our study to find out the most appropriate dose of fertilizer N with rhizobium inoculation. Our objective was to reduce the chemical fertilizer use without compromising peanut productivity which is very much an emerging issue in peanut cultivation. We chose as our maximum 100% of the recommended dose of nitrogen (RDN) for the agro-ecology and then examined the effects of sizeable reductions in this amount, i.e. by 25% and 50%.While wanting to reduce N fertilizer as much as practical, we did not wish to unduly compromise peanut yields. We considered that treatments of 50%, 75% and 100% of RDN enabled us to examine the trade-offs between productivity and low N applications. These rates of N have also been used by others in recent experimental research trials, e.g.:

Sharma, S.; Jat, N.L.; Puniya, M.M.; Shivran, A.C.; Choudhary, S. Fertility levels and biofertilizers on nutrient concentrations, uptake and quality of groundnut. Ann. Agric. Res. New Series. 2014, 35(1), 71–74.

Irungbam, P.; Pramanick, M.; Shashidhar, K.S. Effect of different nutrient management on growth parameters and yield of summer groundnut in New Alluvial Zone of West Bengal. Eco. Env. & Cons. 2016, 22, 39–42.

We have added to the material and methods (lines 190-193) to better explain the selection of the experimental treatments.

Comments: Does mulch are farmers friendly to apply and also these are economically peaceable?

Authors’ response:

The application of polythene mulch may be done either manually or by machine: it is suitable for both subsistence and large scale farmers.Most of the farmers around our study region are small and marginal and anecdotally they prefer manual mulching practices.  Farmers achieve significantly higher economic returnswith the adoption of plastic film mulching which required additional 75.03 USD for one ha land (economics of this practice are discussed in the companion paper which has been submitted to this journal).

We have added to the introduction (lines 109-111) to clarify that polythene mulch is a practice available to, and useful for, both small and large farming enterprises.

Comments: Result and discussion are together, less focused on discussion, it is suggested to focus more on the discussion section and justification of results.

Authors’ response: We have added additional relevant comment to emphasizeand justify our results (lines 294-681)

Comments: Line 44 What is recommended rate and need to add here and how recommended rate was decided?

Authors’ response: The specific recommended dose has been mentioned in manuscript and the recommended dose was decided according to the fertilizer recommendation by ICAR-Directorate of Groundnut Research for West Bengal region.

We have clarified the specific dosage here (line 44) and clarified the selection of N-rate treatments (lines 193-197)

Comments: The authors need to give the exact quantity of phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) applied as recommended dose.

Authors’ response: The exact quantity of phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) have been mentioned in the materials and methods (line 191)

Comments: Line. 161-162: The authors write as “In the 100% of RDN treatment 25 kg N ha-1”. Please cite the author that recommended this rate.

Authors’ response: Proper citation has been given for this recommendation (lines 193-195).

Comments: Line. 173: The authors need to mention the name of strain of Rhizobium used in this experiment.

Authors’ response: The name of the strain has been mentioned, now at line 214

Comments: Line. 181-182: “Irrigations”- The authors need to tell about the critical water requirement stages of peanut and the amount of water added at each critical water requirement stage.

Authors’ response: We have amended the text to include information on the irrigation schedule – now at lines 226-228.

Comments: Line. 207-208: What is 50? Do you mean 50 Days after emergence then please mention here and recast the sentence. ‘’The total microbial population was enumerated at initial, 50, and at harvesting to judge the population development across the growing season’’.

Authors’ response: We have rewritten this sentence to better clarify its meaning (now at lines 257-258).

Comments: Check heading 2.3.5, need to add space, similar there are many places there is need to check the space after “.”, normally there is no space added.  Please check throughout the manuscript.

Authors’ response: We have reviewed and corrected such typological errors throughout the manuscript (this error now corrected at line 281)

Comments: Line. 243: In results and discussion part, authors only discussed the highest results but author did not discuss some results which are statistically similar with these highest results. The authors should also discuss the results which are statistically similar with these highest results.

Authors’ response: We have enlarged our results and discussion to now include the broader range of results (throughout this section, lines 294-681)

Comments: In Table 2, the authors mentioned 31.30 ab value for treatment “100 % RDN + Rh” while 31.20 a value for treatment “75 % RDN”. How is it possible higher value may contain ‘’ab’’ letter while lower value ‘’a’’ letter. Please review it critically.

Authors’ response: This was our typographical mistake. We have corrected it (now near line 336)

Comments: Fig.1. a. Y axis, temperature degree sign is not corrected

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested (now near line 166)

Comments: This manuscript presents the results of a field experiment over two growing seasons, in which the effects of nitrogen fertilizer, rhizobium inoculation and plastic mulching on peanut yield and soil characteristics were examined. Results are presented for each treatment in great detail, often with two digits behind the decimal point. This holds also for the soil nitrogen balances presented in Tables 4 and 5; it is hard to believe that authors can present these numbers with the suggested high precision.

Authors’ response: We thank the reviewer for their time and comments on our manuscript. We have taken utmost care and precision throughout this experiment, however to improve confidence in our results we have revised Tables 4 and 5 and now present results to one decimal point only (lines 658 & 669).

Comments: The conclusion section suggest that this study confirms the results of earlier studies, reviewed in the Introduction section and the Results and Discussion section. There is little scientific news. This is in part related to the fact that authors have not sharply and clearly described (in the Introduction section) the knowledge gap that they wanted to tackle through their research. They just state that ‘little is known’ but that does not follow from the Introduction section and the Results and Discussion section. Because authors confirm what earlier studies have observed already.

Authors’ response: We have rewritten our statement in the Introduction (lines 131-139) to clarify that it is the combination of three improved crop management options (polythene mulch, N fertilizer and rhizobia application) about which little previous research has been conducted.

In the Results & Discussion we do identify where parts of our research (e.g. the application of each of the improved crop management options in turn) are similar to previous research; this is standard practice. However, our research does not merely ‘confirm what earlier studies have observed already’ and our conclusion states very clearly that we have identified new findings into the effects of combing these three improved crop management potions. We have not amended the conclusion in response to this comment.

Comments: The manuscript is lengthy (660 lines) and contains 9 figures and 5 Tables. In addition, the literature lists contains 95 references. Evidently, authors have not been selective in presenting the key results only and in using only key references. The manuscript reads like a report, not as a manuscript for a scientific journal. Authors provide three photo’s in a supplementary file, which are illustrative.

Authors’ response: We have edited the manuscript to reduce its length where possible, and have removed older references and supplementary figures.

Comments: In summary, it is unclear what the scientific news of this manuscript is for an international audience. Perhaps, it is hidden somewhere in the text. Authors have to highlight the novelty of the research and of the results. Next, the manuscript has to be greatly reduced in length (by a factor of 2 or 3). Part of the text and figures and tables could be placed in the supplementary Information file. Evidently, this manuscript needs a major revision.

Authors’ response: We have better edited the abstract and introduction (lines 32-139) to highlight the key contributions of this manuscript. These changes, together with the reduction in length throughout, have ensure that the manuscript is more targeted and easier to read.

The irrelevant portion in the manuscript were deleted accordingly and number of references was also reduced significantly

Comments: L107: is that true? Please formulate the scientific unknows more precisely; what is unknown? What is the relevance of knowledge related to combining polythene mulch with different rates of N fertilizer ?

Authors’ response: We have rewritten these sentences (lines 131-134) to better clarify previous knowledge about mulching and N fertilizer rates under peanut crops, and the contribution this manuscript makes.

Comments: L115: why this site? What was the previous landuse? Was peanut planted here before?

Authors’ response: We haveclarified the location of the experimental site, and of research into peanut cultivation in West Bengal, at lines 146-151.

Comments:L140: what is a good water holding capacity?

Authors’ response: We have clarified the water holding capacity of the soil (lines 173-174)

Comments:L146: was the experiment conducted at the same place in both years?

Authors’ response: Yes, the experiment conducted at the same place in both years. We have clarified this (lines 146-147)

Comments:L160: before the plastic sheet was covering the soil?

Authors’ response: No... Plastic sheet was applied at final stages, as we state at lines 184-189

Comments:L163: how to distribute 12.5 kg N as urea evenly across one ha? By hand, machine?

Authors’ response: We have clarified the application of N fertilizer (lines 196-202)

Comments:L171: why farm yard manure, why gypsum?

Authors’ response: Gypsum was applied to ensure uniform pod setting and development according to ICAR guidelines; FYM was not applied. We have amended the text to clarify, now at lines 211-214

Comments:L303: Section 3.2 has too much overlap with section 3.1

Authors’ response: Both sections have been edited to reduce overlap (lines 364-505).

Comments: There are many typing errors, missing spaces between words, missing superscript or subscripts, etc. Some sentences are lengthy and complicated (e.g. L165-169). Please edit the whole manuscript carefully

Authors’ response: We have edited the manuscript thoroughly to improve comprehension. The cited sentence has been revised and simplified (now lines 204-209)

1. The authors look at the effect of N application, inoculation and mulching on peanut growth and yield.  There was not enough information presented to adequately review the manuscript and some of the results are surprising and not explained.

Respectfully we disagree with this reviewer, and suggest that this manuscript does provide valid evidence of the effects of N fertiliser, inoculation and mulching on peanut growth and yield. The responses from three separate reviewers support our argument.

2. The main mystery is N fixation.  No data was presented on nodulation and the N balance method reported did not allow the reader to estimate potential N fixation. Clearly relying on N fix alone was not enough to sustain maximum yield, and that seems to be the main conclusion that can be safely drawn from this data-set. But without information on nodulation...

Respectfully, we disagree with the reviewer. The main focus of our research was the effectof combining polythene mulch, N fertilizer and rhizobium inoculation: we did not explicitly examine nodulation or potential N fixation in this paper, about which the facts are well known.

We note (e.g. lines 86-89) that nodulation is inhibited with excessive inorganic N fertilizer application (reference 25), and that combining microbial inoculants with fertilizersmaintains a balanced soil nutrient pool (reference 26). We further state (lines 89-98) that N fixation has been observed to provide additional N to peanut crops (references 13-18). These points the reviewer finds lacking from our paper are well established and we are not disputing them. Rather we are building on these already-known facts when we seek to understand the effects on peanut productivity and quality, soil moisture and soil macronutrient dynamics of combining polythene mulch, N fertilizer and rhizobium inoculation. This is stated very clearly in our introduction (lines 131-139).

3. I am skeptical that the plating/broth method for determining rhizobium was successful.  There is no difference between treatments, and (assuming the plots were re-used - which is not described) why rhizobium would not uniformly increase following a peanut crop in the following year is a mystery.  Rhizobium are known to build up such that inoculation is not necessary year-on-year if crops are adequately nodulated in the first season. Yet this data, without comment, does not support that at all. Nor does it make sense that reasonably high N inputs would have no effect on populations.  I don't trust the data.

In both experimental seasons, our data show that, while there is no significant difference between rhizobia populations between treatments with 100% of recommended dose of N and treatments with 75% of recommended dose of N, we did observe a trend whereby rhizobia populations were lower in the treatments with 100% of the recommended dose of N (e.g. Figure 3c & 3d). This suggests that higher doses of N (i.e. greater than the 100% recommended dose) may be detrimental to rhizobia populations, but that the doses recommended (by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research) are not detrimental to rhizobia populations.

We agree with the reviewer that rhizobia are known to build up over time in fields, however thiswas the first time a legume crop had been cultivated in that experimental field. Additionally, between peanut crops there was a cereal crop which may have hampered soil rhizobia colonization. We have amended the material and methods (lines 146-151) to better clarify the field conditions

4. The conclusions around mulching and water use are poorly explained and I am not sure the authors understand them.  It is not clear from the methods why there should be any differences at all if irrigation was matched to plant needs at critical stages.  But clearly what needed to be communicated was that the SAME amount of irrigation was applied to mulched and unmulched treatments. The reader then needs to assume that the efficiency of water use was greater under mulching. WUE was not presented or determined. This is perhaps not surprising given the misunderstanding about 'higher water under mulch'. At the end of a season, one hopes for lower water under mulch so that available water is converted into harvestable yield.  But without biomass measures to either provide context around water use and transpiration demand, and determine harvest index, the water data is of no value.

The same amount of irrigation water was applied to all treatments. We have clarified this at lines 228-229. Mulched treatments showed improved plant water retention relative to unmulched plots.

Data on biomass accumulation (from which HI may be calculated) form part of the second paper in this series, which has been submitted to Agronomy in parallel with this paper. Harvest indices were significantly higher for mulched treatments than non-mulched, in both experimental years. Thus, peanut in mulched treatments had a higher conversion of water into harvestable yield than unmulched plots. We have amended the text (lines 531-535) to clarify this point.

5. The microbial data is of little value and can be removed.  Counting CFU's is of minimal scientific value.  So, in short, I would not recommend publication as, although many things were measured, they were the wrong things. And the data is logically inconsistent.

We respectfully disagree with the reviewer that counting CFUs is of little value. Other comparable studies (e.g. Banerjee et al., 2017; Dey et al., 2004) use this method of accounting for rhizobia populations in soil. We have not added in these additional citations in the materials and methodsas we are seeking to reduce our reference list and this methodology is reputable and well-recognised. If the editor requests, we are happy to incorporate additional citations to support our methodology here.

Comments:In the results and discussion section, it is difficult to follow which factors you are discussing at many times. I would urge you to do some reorganization, structuring this section so that each paragraph is dedicated to the effects of one independent variable. I understand this is difficult given that you have a multi-factorial design, but I think this would really help clarify which factors you are discussing when you are contrasting treatments, especially if you further clarify your topic sentences so that it is clear you are discussing the effects of nitrogen, inoculation, or mulching. Alternatively, if you are insistent on keeping the existing structure, or if you at least want to keep it in instances when you are using a comparison between two treatments to discuss the effects of several factors, you could add clarifying statements throughout the paragraph to indicate which factors you are talking about. For example, “treatment A yielded more than treatment B, suggesting that nitrogen addition, mulching, inoculation, and/or the combination thereof improve the yield of peanut.” The previous example would be a good formula for a topic sentence in that case, because it would be clear that the contents of the paragraph were derived from the comparison of the two treatments, and it would be clear that you were going to discuss nitrogen, mulching, inoculation, and interactions, in that order. If you do discuss several factors in one paragraph, please be sure to group all your discussion of any one factor together within the paragraph- there are places now where you jump from discussing one factor to the next and then back to the first, and it’s very disorienting. I do think you have enough material to dedicate an entire paragraph to each factor in most cases, and I think it would be a much more readable paper if I knew from reading the topic sentence which factor you would be discussing. This is especially the case when you didn’t have differences among treatments but you did have differences among factors that you discuss. I have included some more specific suggestions to get you started. In any regard, your results and discussion could use more sentences that are clear and to the point, following a formula similar to “x affected y.”

Authors’ response:We thank the reviewer for this helpful suggestion, and have revised the results & discussion section to improve clarity and flow (now lines 294-681)

Comments: You have good topic sentences in many places, however, they are absent in some places throughout the results and discussion section. Please ensure that every paragraph in the results and discussion section starts with a sentence that describes the overall theme of the paragraph. I have pointed this out in a few places, but not everywhere.

Authors’ response: We have revised the results & discussion (lines 294-681) to improve clarity and flow. 

Comments: It sounds from your introduction that you are particularly interested in the combination of your factors; however, I have found no discussion of interactions in the body of the results and discussion. From your tables, it is clear that you tested the interaction of mulching and nitrogen (but no interactions including inoculation), so I’m wondering why this discussion is absent. Either amend the introduction to make it clear that you are primarily interested in studying these factors independently, or add some discussion of the interactions.

Authors’ response: The discussion of interactions has been added (Line- 355-359; Line- 408-413; Line- 437-440)

Comments: Throughout the paper, you use the words “inoculation” and “bio-fertilization” interchangeably. I would suggest using “inoculation” consistently, to help readers avoid confusing bio-fertilization with nitrogen fertilization.

Authors’ response: We have revised the manuscript to use “inoculation” instead of “bio-fertilization “consistently throughout.

Comments: Throughout the paper, you refer to treatments by which levels of which factors have been applied to them, but you do not state “non-mulched” or “unfertilized” or “0% RDN” when the levels are zero. I would suggest adding this as a point of clarification, because there could be some confusion. For example, when you discuss 100% RDN treatments with Rh applied, you could mean the average of both the mulched and non-mulched treatment, or you could mean the non-mulched treatment alone.

Authors’ response: We have revised the manuscript and included this clarification throughout.

Comments: Agronomy Journal uses APA citation style, which names authors in-line rather than referring to articles by number. You have some inconsistencies in your references list- sometimes year is bolded, other times it isn’t; sometimes there is a space before year, other time there isn’t; sometimes there is a period before year, other times there is a comma; etc. In addition to these inconsistencies, you have applied the incorrect citation style to your references list. Please consistently apply APA style to your in-line citations and your references list. I would recommend using a citation manager such as Mendeley, which can automatically generate in-line citations and a references list that complies with any style at the click of a button. Although it still requires some proofreading, it does allow you to change between styles more easily than manually managing citations.

Authors’ response: All the references have been corrected according to the style guideline of the MDPI journal.

Comments:Your bar figures could be oriented more intuitively. Please put the bars next to each other which you wish to compare. For example, in Figure 1, you are comparing the initial time point of the mulching treatments to the initial time point of the non-mulching treatments, so therefore you should have a group at initial, 50 DAE, and harvest, and then color code by treatments. Since you have so many treatments in panels c and d, you will likely have to use different types of hashing as you did in Figure 5. As you have it, with the three different types of letters (lowercase, lowercase italics, and uppercase) it is not understandable. Typically, uppercase letters are used to compare larger groups to each other, for example, if you were comparing the overall mulching to the non-mulching, across time points, you could put an uppercase letter above the entire group to indicate a difference between these treatments. Please re-orient Figures 2, 3, and 8 as described above.

Authors’ response: We thank the reviewer for thesedetailed and helpful comments and have made the suggested corrections.

Comments:In your figure caption, you say “within treatments, numbers followed by different letters indicate significant differences….” Firstly, there are no numbers on your figures 2, 3, and 8. Secondly, and critically, you are not comparing within treatment. For example, in Figure 8, you are not comparing the nitrogen of the kernel to the nitrogen of the haulm within the non-mulching treatment (although that’s what it looks like from how you oriented your figures). You need to create a new statement for each figure where you have means comparison, for example for Figure 8 it could say something like “Within each nutrient of each plant part, bars accompanying different letters indicate significant differences….”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested for all relevant figures

Comments:Your line figures are difficult to interpret, because all the points and error bars are on top of each other. One solution to this is to stagger the points and error bars slightly in order to make it readable. In R, the command for this is positiondodge. Enlarging the figures may help as well- perhaps if you cut off the x axis at 0.30 and widen the figures to the margins. Please fix Figures 4 and 6, particularly panels c and d, so that it is possible to tell where one error bar begins and another one ends when printed at scale.

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested for all relevant figures

Comments: You’re missing quite a few spaces, particularly surrounding units and in figure titles. I marked down quite a few but you may want to read through once just to ensure there are no missing spaces.

Authors’ response: We have revised the manuscript and corrected typographical mistakes throughout

Comments: Also you reference other authors using specific mulch materials (thick, thin, transparent), but you don’t describe your own mulch material. Please add a description of your mulch (thickness, transparency) in your materials and methods section, and when discussing other authors findings using specific types of mulch, connect or contrast them to your own.

Authors’ response: The polythene mulch which was used in our experiment was transparent with 30µ thickness; this is stated at line 181.

Comments:Ln 34: change “particularly” to “and it is particularly important”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 34.

Comments:Ln 37: remove “to soil nutrient deficiencies”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 38.

Comments:Ln 40: replace “winters” with “winter”

Authors’ response: We have notmade this suggested alteration (at line 40)– here it is correct to talk about “two winters” as these are the seasons over which the experiments were conducted.

Comments:Ln 48: insert “that” between “treatment” and “supplied”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 50.

Comments:Ln 53: remove “and”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 56.

Comments:Ln 68: insert “but” after comma

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 71.

Comments:Ln 103: superscript -1

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 95.

Comments:Ln 122: remove extra space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 155

Comments:Ln 153: replace “RND” with “RDN” and change the word order to match

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 183.

Comments:Ln 161: describe how this recommendation came to be.

Authors’ response: Described as suggested at lines 196-202.

Comments: Ln 166: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 205.

Comments:Ln 167: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 206.

Comments:Ln 173: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 215.

Comments:Ln 174: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now line 215.

Comments:Ln 188: provide more details regarding “safe place”- how was it made safe, and what was it made safe from?

Authors’ response: We have clarified our meaning here, now at line 236.

Comments:Ln 200: replace “Sound” with “sound”. Define “mature kernels” somewhere in this section. In the formula, use “kernels” not “kernel.”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Definition of mature kernel has been given; now lines 250-251

Comments:Ln 207: by “50,”, do you mean “50 days?”

Authors’ response: We have clarified the meaning of this sentence, now at lines 257.

Comments:Ln 209: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now at lines 259.

Comments:Ln 230: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested, now at lines 281.

Comments:Ln 231: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 282.

Comments:Ln 253-254: unclear what “significantly recorded the maximum number of pods per plant” means. Do you just mean it recorded the most pods per plant? In general, you don’t need to include ‘significant’ or “significantly” in scientific discussions, because you should only be discussing findings that are significant. If you want to emphasize this point, re-word the sentence.

Authors’ response: We have removed the word significant to clarify our meaning here. Now at lines 305.

Comments:Ln 259: what are “good results?” Please specify, and avoid using language that implies judgment.

Authors’ response: We have better clarified our findings. Now at lines 311.

Comments:Ln 263-264: The beginning of this sentence is confusing- please re-word.

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 316-317.

Comments:Ln 273: in line 272, you were discussing the second season, and now it seems you are discussing the first season; however, you haven’t made readers aware of this change. Consider reorganizing, or at least clarifying which season you are discussing.

Authors’ response: Reorganized as suggested. Now at lines 326-327.

Comments:Ln 273-275: Here, you introduce evidence that is not backed up by your statistics. You cannot say that the 100% RDN Rh mulched treatments had greater hundred kernel weight than the non-mulched treatment, because they both have the letter a next to their numbers on your table. For all we know, it was just random variation that caused the mulched treatment to be higher than the non-mulched treatment; this is why we do statistics. In very few cases, it’s acceptable to add in “qualitatively” different treatments into a line of reasoning, for example, if you notice a broad trend and all but one treatment at a given level is statistically higher and the last treatment is numerically higher, but not statistically, you could say that you noticed an overall trend where higher observations occurred at that given level. Please review your results and discussion section for any other mention of treatments being different when they were not statistically different. In a peer reviewed paper, the assumption is that if you say something is 2% greater than something else, you have the statistics to back that up, so you don’t have to qualify every difference with “statistically,” because that’s an assumption your readers are going to make.

Authors’ response: Thank you for your valuable suggestions. We have tried to maintain throughout the manuscript.

Comments:Ln 276: Instead of saying “different,” please describe how it is different- greater or lower

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 332.

Comments:Ln 294: replace “also improved” with “has been shown to improve”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 351-532.

Comments:Ln 300: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested.

Comments:Ln 306: insert space.

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 367.

Comments:Ln 308: insert space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 370.

Comments:Ln 309: remove “)”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 371.

Comments:Ln 311: replace “high” with “higher”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 373.

Comments:Ln 313: increased compared to what?

Authors’ response: We have clarified the manuscript to improve our meaning, Compared to rest other treatments and it has been mentioned in manuscript. Now at lines 378.

Comments:Ln 318-320: this sentence belongs earlier in the paragraph

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 384-385.

Comments:Ln 325: not 100% RDN mulching

Authors’ response: It was our mistake. We have made correction as suggested. Now at lines 392.

Comments:Ln 326: insert space.

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 394.

Comments:Ln 328: replace “variations… treatments” with “no statistical differences were observed between treatments”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 395-396.

Comments:Ln 342-344: this should be a different paragraph

Authors’ response: This portion has been removed and only the interaction result has been kept. Now at lines 417-426.

Comments:Ln 352: remove “significantly”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 428.

Comments:Ln 357: new paragraph

Authors’ response: We have made a new paragraph. Now at lines 441.

Comments:Figure 2: label years more clearly, either on the figure or in the caption “effect of polythene mulching in 2015-16 (a) and 2016-17”

Authors’ response: Years of experiment have been clearly indicated on figure.

Comments:Ln 374-375: remove “differing… Rh.” You only discuss mulching in this paragraph.

Authors’ response: Removed as suggested. Now at lines 460-461.

Comments:Ln 377: remove “although…plots.”

Authors’ response: Removed as suggested. Now at lines 463.

Comments:Ln 379: replace “different” with higher or lower

Authors’ response: Replaced as suggested. Now at lines 366.

Comments:Ln 381: did you use transparent mulch? Compare/contrast

Authors’ response: We used transparent mulch and it has been mentioned in materials and methods section. Now at lines 181.

Comments:Ln 386: add topic sentence

Authors’ response: The suggestion has been made in the paragraph. Now at lines 415-416

Comments:Ln 399: What is this similar to?

Authors’ response: We want to indicate the similar effect of mulching on both bacteria and rhizobium populationbut the word “similarly” is not suitable on that position. So, we have removed the word. Now at lines 486.

Comments:Ln 400-401: remove “The… that”

Authors’ response: Removed as suggested. Now at lines 488-489.

Comments:Ln 306: remove “except”

Authors’ response: Removed as suggested. Now at lines 493.

Comments:Ln 406: reword “which was lower than all other treatments”

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 494.

Comments:Ln 491: insert comma after March

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 586.

Comments:Ln 494: are you discussing under mulched soil? Clarify

Authors’ response: Yes, we were discussing the section under mulched condition. Now at lines 588-592.

Comments:Ln 504: insert topic sentence

Authors’ response: The suggestion has been made in the paragraph. Now at lines 540-541

Comments:Ln 508: remove space

Authors’ response: Corrected as suggested. Now at lines 604.

Comments:Ln 519: insert topic sentence

Authors’ response: The suggestion has been made in the paragraph. Now at lines 555-556

Comments:Conclusion: well done, very concise and clear summary of your key findings

Authors’ response: Thank you for your comments.

Reviewer comments

Authors’ response

1. English language and style: Moderate English changes required

A co-author who is a native English speaker and who has a BA in linguistics, Alison M Laing, has fully edited the manuscript for English language and style

2. Authors did not provide the clean copy so get the clear idea while from track changes and response letter, it looks majority of the comments have been incorporated but chances of improvement are still there. Overall, revision looks satisfactory. 

We apologize for this oversight and have included both track-changes and clean copies of the MS with our updated submission

Reviewer 3 (Second round) comments

Authors response

1. English language and style: Moderate English changes required.

A co-author who is a native English speaker and who has a BA in linguistics, Alison M Laing, has fully edited the manuscript for English language and style

2. The Manuscript Title includes nutrient dynamics, productivity and microbial activity. It is reasonable for any reader to expect the productivity to be reported (not have to look in another paper).

It is reasonable for a reader of a paper discussing nutrient dynamics to expect that N fixation would be presented, in a pulse crop, with treatments that include N addition and inoculation. Your rudimentary N balance Table suggests the authors agree. You just have not collected the right information to fill the Table. Microbial activity was not measured. Some plates were done and microbial numbers were counted - the 'activity' of those microbes was never measured. The science of counting numbers of microbes is of little value - the function of those microbes is what is important and that is where science has now headed. In fact, the only part of the title that is actually fully discussed in the manuscript is soil moisture.

2. The details of peanut productivity are shown in table 3 and discussed in section 3.2.

We have prepared the N balanced sheets on the basis of available soil N, i.e. the fraction of total soil N. This is the approach used by Jain et al. (2017) where they also used the inorganic N along with organic sources.

Jain, N.K.; Meena, H.N.; Bhaduri, D. Improvement in productivity, water-use efficiency, and soil nutrient dynamics of summer peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.) through use of polythene mulch, hydrogel, and nutrient management. Commun Soil Sci Plant Anal. 2017, 48(5), 549–564. https://doi.org/10.1080/00103624.2016.1269792.

As we have only counted microbial populations and not microbial activities we have removed the words ‘microbial activities’ from the manuscript title. We have retained the information within the body of the paper in case it is useful to other researchers, but we have altered the emphasis of the manuscript.