Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors,

The work submitted for publication presents an experimental design appropriate to the set objectives. It is an important test to evaluate the possibility of using waste from the food industry as fertilizer and therefore it has relevance in the circular economy.

There are, however, certain aspects that can be improved to increase the final quality of the work

The most detailed comments are exposed in the attached file.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Paolo Campus

Response to the reviewers reports on the Manuscript Agronomy-1999096.

I would like to thank the reviewer for reading and commenting on my scientific work. I found the comments reasonable and certainly helpful to improve the article as they highlighted many errors and inaccuracies that I failed to see. I addressed the revisions as best as I could and applied the changes suggested. The revisions were edited in the document attached with comments to each suggestion and applied in the manuscript with track changes. Track changes were not applied when tables, figures and pictures were moved, modified or replaced and when the references list was edited.

I could not however address the following comments for lack of time:

 

Report1

• Line 274-275: The statement would be strengthened if a correlation coefficient were provided
• Line 320: The behavior of Fe can be explained by the antagonistic effect with Ca. What information does the correlation between these two elements give?

Section 4:

• This section should be rewritten using the correlations between the studied variables to reaffirm the arguments presented. Considering that the control nutrient medium (Hoagland) has the appropriate rations between the nutrients, the authors could make these calculations with the nutrients provided with the addition of urchin powder and be able to compare among treatments.

 

I am also not sure what calculations the reviewer is suggesting since the concentration of nutrients in the vegetative parts and fruits in treatments and control were provided in tables. Perhaps the average total nutrients uptake per plant as sum of nutrients in vegetative parts and fruits minus the total amount of nutrients provided at the start with UWP addition and potting mix and the reminder nutrient in the potting mix at the end of the Trial? In this case I need to point out that the roots biomass and roots nutrient content were not analysed.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Please see attachment

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Paolo Campus

Response to the reviewers reports on the Manuscript Agronomy-1999096.

I would like to thank the reviewer for reading and commenting on my scientific work. I found the comments reasonable and certainly helpful to improve the article as they highlighted many errors and inaccuracies that I failed to see. I addressed the revisions as best as I could and applied the changes suggested. The revisions were edited in the document attached with comments to each suggestion and applied in the manuscript with track changes. Track changes were not applied when tables, figures and pictures were moved, modified or replaced and when the references list was edited.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The manuscript agronomy-1999096 is a well design and written work. Congratulation to the authors for their work. I suggest some comments to improve the manuscript and further works.

Abstract: indicate the P content of UWP

Line 51-52: be careful with the list of micronutrients, Cd and Pd are not nutrients

Table 1: I suggest a new order in the macro-elements, N,P, K, Ca, Mg, Na. It ´s only a detail, but NPK first is more visual in agronomy. Delete EC and pH from the Total Hoagland column.

Include a figure of the final pH and EC in a similar way to figure 7. These data are important

Line 169:  the statistic of table 9 indicates significant differences between T6 and T7. Review this sentence.

Figure 2: I suppose (please, confirm if I´m right and moreover, include this information in M&M section) nMDS was performed with values of table 3. Hence Why did you represent the bubble size related to K? similar comment for Figure 4

Section 3.6

I suggest a deeper analysis of results of this section with the inclusion of a nutrient efficiency analysis. Provide a balance of nutrients applied, nutrients uptake by plant and yield, biomass or similar parameters. This could be useful to support your discussion (mainly lines 332 – 351)

Table 12: include the treatment 8 to compare the residual effect of Hoagland solution and UWP. This information is relevant for the nutrient management in a potential second crop.

Discussion: Reflect all the modification of results in the discussion

Line 347-349: This affirmation (I absolutely agree) can be supported by the salts used in the Hoagland solution. I consider that this information is relevant and has to bre included as a table in appendix. About the composition, did you used chelating agents for micronutrients? If yes, this could explain easy the better uptake of micronutrients in T8 with respect to T1-7 (despite the different total amount of nutrients applied in each treatment, of course)

Lines 382 – 391: Boron is a very particular micronutrient and the range of normality and toxicity is close. The B content in UWP is really high and the consequent B level in the substrate is high. Do you consider a problem for sensitive crops? This comment is in line with your conclusion (lines 443 – 446). I suggest including this comment in the discussion.

Conclusion, include the ratio of UWP applied in T7 (5%) for a better reading

The tables 2, 4, 5, 7 and, 8 contain results of the statistical analysis. This information is included in the text. I consider that these tables are not essential in the main manuscript and can be included in appendix. In contrast some tables of appendix are main information and have to be located in the main manuscript, tables 9, 10, 11.

Include some photos (appendix) of the plants to support the aspect (chlorosis) of the plants at the end of the assay. For further works, I suggest the use of SPAD index or other radiometric measurements (NDVI index or similar) to monitor the nutrient status of the plant and provide proofs of chlorosis.

Author Response

Paolo Campus

Response to the reviewers reports on the Manuscript Agronomy-1999096.

I would like to thank the reviewer for reading and commenting on my scientific work. I found the comments reasonable and certainly helpful to improve the article as they highlighted many errors and inaccuracies that I failed to see. I addressed the revisions as best as I could and applied the changes suggested. The revisions were edited in the document attached with comments to each suggestion and applied in the manuscript with track changes. Track changes were not applied when tables, figures and pictures were moved, modified or replaced and when the references list was edited.

I could not however address the following comments for lack of time:

 

Report 3

Section 3.6

• I suggest a deeper analysis of results of this section with the inclusion of a nutrient efficiency analysis. Provide a balance of nutrients applied, nutrients uptake by plant and yield, biomass or similar parameters. This could be useful to support your discussion (mainly lines 332 – 351).

 

I am also not sure what calculations the Reviewer is suggesting since the concentration of nutrients in the vegetative parts and fruits in treatments and control were provided in tables. Perhaps the average total nutrients uptake per plant as sum of nutrients in vegetative parts and fruits minus the total amount of nutrients provided at the start with UWP addition and potting mix and the reminder nutrient in the potting mix at the end of the Trial? In this case I need to point out that the roots biomass and roots nutrient content were not analysed.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear Authors,

You have made most of the suggested changes in the manuscript “Assessing processing waste from the sea urchin (Centrosphanus rodgersii) fishery as an organic fertilizer” but there are still issues to correct.

Abstract:

The summary has been modified from the first version maintaining its correctness.

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

You do not include a graphical abstract

The units need to be checked (line 16)

Introduction:

The restructuring of the introduction and the inclusion of a few new sentences makes them have an argumentative unity.

Material and methods:

The section of material and methods has been improved especially color measurement and clarification of nMDS methods and some tables have been modified.

 

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

It is necessary to review the terminology used in the studied parameters in order to unify the way of citing them (lines 170-171)

 

Results:

In this section, the authors have also done almost all the suggested corrections. Despite not providing correlations between the studied parameters, the modifications introduced in the text allow us to understand the results obtained.

 

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

Figure 4 is not visible on the copy provided

Review the format of section 3.2 (line 216-223)

Line 373: Review the format

Review units and format in Table 2 (line 217) and table 4 (fresh weigh)

Consider deleting graph 7 since the values have already been included in table 1. There is unnecessary repetition of information. Also remove the citation of this graph within the text.

Avoid labeling photographs as pictures. Consider them as figures. In this case it is necessary to renumber all the remaining figures both in the captions and in the text.

References:

Rewrite bibliographic citations with more than two authors. Consult MDPI Reference list and citation style guide.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Below my responses in red to the last comments

Abstract:

The summary has been modified from the first version maintaining its correctness.

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

You do not include a graphical abstract

Graphical abstract uploaded as pdf

The units need to be checked (line 16)

Units have been checked, macronutrients were given originally as a percentage of weight on weight (%w/w) and are reported as ex. Ca 40 g 100g-1 ; micronutrients were given as ppm and are reported as ex. B 38 mg kg-1

Introduction:

The restructuring of the introduction and the inclusion of a few new sentences makes them have an argumentative unity.

Material and methods:

The section of material and methods has been improved especially color measurement and clarification of nMDS methods and some tables have been modified.

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

It is necessary to review the terminology used in the studied parameters in order to unify the way of citing them (lines 170-171)

The terminology for the studied parameters was unified as follows, °brix, pH and titratable acidity abbreviated as TA when cited in the text. References to Total soluble solid or TSS or Acidity were deleted.

Results:

In this section, the authors have also done almost all the suggested corrections. Despite not providing correlations between the studied parameters, the modifications introduced in the text allow us to understand the results obtained.

In this section there are a few points to be checked:

Figure 4 is not visible on the copy provided

Figure 4 should be visible now.

Review the format of section 3.2 (line 216-223). Perhaps the reviewer meant section 3.1?

The format of section 3.1 was changed placing Table 1 just after the paragraph followed by Figure 1 and Figure 2 fitting in one page.

Line 373: Review the format

Format reviewed.

Review units and format in Table 2 (line 217) and table 4 (fresh weigh)

The units and format of Table 2 was changed with the order of parameters in columns as it appear in text and figure 2. Table 4 Fresh weight reviewed.

Consider deleting graph 7 since the values have already been included in table 1. There is unnecessary repetition of information. Also remove the citation of this graph within the text.

Graph 7 was deleted as well as citation of graph 7 in the text.

Avoid labeling photographs as pictures. Consider them as figures. In this case it is necessary to renumber all the remaining figures both in the captions and in the text.

Pictures have been renamed as Figures. Figure caption number and references in the text have been reordered.

References:

Rewrite bibliographic citations with more than two authors. Consult MDPI Reference list and citation style guide.

The bibliographic citation with more than two authors have been checked. Previously cited as: Author et al., are now cited with the full list of authors.