Dynamics of Runoff and Soil Erosion on Abandoned Steep Vineyards in the Mosel Area, Germany
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The present manuscript is to investigate surface dynamics of abandoned vineyard related to the level of erosion and sediment conditions using a case study of Mosel, Germany. The analysis and results are rigorous. The statistical analysis for management groups clearly shows the dynamics of surface erosion. Although one of the conditions is runoff dynamics, the overall theme is not about 'water.' I would like to suggest authors to submit this manuscript to a more appropriate theme at MDPI such as Agriculture or Land. As a hydrologist, I accepted the review request with expectation of more runoff dynamics, but the subject is not about water. In addition, English needs to be improved for further review. It is not terribly bad, but many sentences use jargon, unnecessary adjectives, and incomplete. I highly recommend an editing service by MDPI. Mostly simple errors but too many.
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Manuscript " Dynamics of runoff and soil erosion on abandoned steep vineyards in the Mosel area, Germany” presents valuable data set that could be interesting to the scientific community. However, at this point, the manuscript is poorly organized, there are many mistakes, at some places citations are missing, abstract also needs improvement so I suggest a major revision. I made changes at many places in manuscript, my suggestion to author is to review those changes and also send manuscript for proofread to someone who is expert in this field. Look at the attached file for my specific comments.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
This study documented sediment and runoff generated from different land uses. It's in general well written, nonetheless errors in language style were detected and these can easily fixed by language editing. My other comments below:
L16 degree of land use changes
L18 higher runoff generation and soil erosion is associated with recently installed or abandoned vineyards.
L20 organic soil management practices such as…
L29 the Neolithic Age
L92 define how the plots were classified into coold coy abold aby ecold ecy
L95 define meaning of in contact, do you mean overlaid by sediments?
L104 pioneer vegetation such as which species?
L107 map has to have a legend showing the meaning of different lines/polygons. Text size of some label are too small. The scale of the map insert is also too small to be useful. Should provide a plot-scale map.
L113 organo-material A-horizon
L143 elaborate on the type and nature of data from Rhineland-Palatinate Statistical Office
L150 the research design needs to be fully explained. Has rainfall simulation been carried out in all types of plots?
L164 sediment load instead of yield
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
Review of manuscript Water-613235
Title: Dynamics of runoff and soil erosion on abandoned steep vineyards in the Mosel area, Germany
General comments
The English grammar is very poor and full of mistakes and should be highly revised and improved. Its poor quality makes difficult the comprehension of sentences and hinders a fluent reading. In my opinion the work fails in scientific rigour either in all sections.
Abstract
The abstract should be re-written with more scientific rigour and should contain some relevant data.
Introduction
The current introduction section does not have a logical continuum and seems like a scarcely linked groups of paragraphs. It is confused and somewhat verbose and repetitive. It should be re-written. A fluent introduction stating the main points about land use and cover change, implication on runoff and erosion and the importance of rainfall simulations in experimental geomorphology and soil science would be adequated. Avoid so much references and refer to references not only in passive way.
P1, L33:…landscape level that significant…
P1, L35-43: not clear
P2, L64: forest receive heavy machinery?
P2, L65: what caused water repellency?
P2, L68: which rainfall experiments?
P2, L74: appropriate traduction of german word
P2, L75-79: confused:…clearing…goats…Please do not include unlinked sentences
P2, L80: explain surface process intensities
P2, L80-86: please reformulate clearly the objective of the work
Materials and Methods
All selected vineyards chosen for the study should be better explained. The selection is confused and disordered. I think they should be better presented in a Table. In Waldrach site no information on temperature and rainfall is included.
P2, L89: which tests?
P2, L90: add coordinates of site
P2, L92: authors should consider changing the site/sampling acronym
P3, L99: the soil management should be better explained
P3, L101: better explain all types of vegetation or say they are the main vegetation. Delete: and others
P3, L104: which pioneer vegetation? The same as above?
Figure 1 is not informative. Better improve
P3, L111: which young?
P3, L119: what means no soil aggregates are found?
P3, L120: what mineral features?
P3, L121: why week soil structure? did you measure structure stability?
P3, L124: coordinates
P3, L126: traduction of german word
P4, L132: specify what type of organic management
P4, L143-149: is this part relevant to the work?
P4, L151: initiation?
Rainfall simulator: As this apparatus is the base of the work, authors should present its complete characteristics and operational details and not superficially. The description of rainfall simulations is rather vague. A picture should help.
Why the overall sum of the entire simulations was used. I think is interesting to reord along time the trend of the soil response under the simulated rainfall.
P4, L168-174: confused re-write
Results
The explanation of results is rather difficult to follow. It is interesting to have min and max values which give an idea of data dispersion but means are more adequate to discuss. There is no synergy in presenting results because data are listed without logical order and usually there is no reference to table or figure. Also comparison of data between different management groups is not always logical. This section should report some references
Table 1: is this table relevant? Though better in a figure.
P6, L208: authors should explain why they have high standard deviation methods
Table 2: What represent these results? Clarify? Better this order: min max avg stddev or even better: min max mean sd or σ. Uniform decimals. You cannot say the lowest median runoff when the value is 0
Are authors sure that ecological is correct for the organic treated vineyard?
P6, L225-227: why this sentence? They are minimum values. Explain
P6, L229: what means: the severity of the process?
Figure 2: add unit at spQ.
Discussion
The first part of the discussion is more similar to an introduction. In my opinion results are not properly discussed and neither comparison between experimented managements in vineyards (abandoned, conventional and ecological) analysed. I should suggest authors to consider deepening into results that, besides high dispersion of data which may be reasonable onto natural surfaces, may have relevant importance. The discussion should also be richer if data of rainfall simulations were presented at intervals and no as totals, which may flatten eventual differences along the trials.
Conclusion
Difficult to follow for the english but can stand alone.
References
Please control the list.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The author has done substantial changes in the manuscript. I still feels that English should be again checked.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer 2,
thank you very much.
We have checked again the language and spelling and corrected the mistakes.
Best regards
Manuel Seeger on behalf of the authors
Reviewer 3 Report
The authors have addressed my concerns listed in previous review.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer 3,
thank you very much for reviewing again our manuscript.
We checked again for mistakes and corrected them.
Best regards
Manuel Seeger on behalf of the authors
Reviewer 4 Report
After acceptance authors should read again the manuscript and pay attention omn any discrepance. Table 2?
Author Response
Dear Reviewer 4,
many thanks for reviewing again our manuscript.
We checked and corrected the mistakes in the numbering of figures and tables.
In addition, we checked again spelling, grammar and consistency of some expressions and corrected them.
We thank you for your very valuable comments.
Best regards
Manuel Seeger, on behalf of the authors
