Discovery of a Lineage of Soil-Dwelling Medetera Species with Multi-Coloured Eyes in Southern Europe (Diptera: Dolichopodidae)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript provides an excellent treatment of an interesting group of flies, primarily the description of several new species.  It is very well written with only a few instances of some minor editing needed.  The paper should be accepted as written.

The manuscript is well constructed in terms of introductory comments in terms of the group (Medetera), its biology, and how the study came about.  It is well-referenced but not over-referenced.  The Materials and Methods is extensive in terms of detail and how current studies are providing previously unknown specimens of scientific value.  It relates this study to more extensive and on-going biological diversity studies.  The process of species descriptions is well explained and detailed.  Figure 2 might be a little complicated and it was a little difficult to read some of the markers on the map.  The map has value in providing distributional data but it is somewhat difficult to read.

The bulk of the paper provides descriptions of seven new species.  The descriptions are excellent in detail and structure.  A significant number of character states are described.  The illustrations in terms of both photographic images and lines drawings are well-prepared.  The terminology used in the descriptions is appropriate to the group.  The key provided to the new species appears workable, though I did not have material to test it.  

The Discussion provides a cladogram and relates the new species described to others in the genus.  I found the discussion of why so many new species were found in a fairly well-known area interesting and compelling.

Overall, this is an excellent contribution.  It is very well written with only a small amount of editing needed.  The information provided is of scientific value and moves our understanding of the taxon forward in a geographic area that we probably thought was completely understood.  It causes us to think that we need to explore habitats that we might have passed as being non-productive in the past.  I enjoyed this paper very much and congratulate 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Overall, we were quite happy with your comments, to be honest. We are also  truly grateful for the effort you made to referee our manuscript. In response of your suggestions, we:

• replaced Figure 2 by another (hopefully better) one, and
• thoroughly checked the entire MS for errors and textual improvements.

We hope the final result meets your expectations.

With kind regards,

Marc Pollet et al.

Reviewer 2 Report

Conclusions and references are well described. It is also recommended to do this for other insects and other species with other applications.

With respect

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

First of all, thanks for taking the time to referee our MS. 

In response of your general comments, we truly explored how we could improve the research design (at this stage it is a bit late to change anything) and the description of our methods but, unfortunately, we were not able to carry out any substantial changes, I am sorry to say. Several of the co-authors and myself reread the MS thoroughly, though, in search for errors and textual improvements. We also replaced Figure 2.

We do hope the final result meets your standards.

With kind regards,

Marc Pollet et al.