An Early Bioinvasion in the Azores. Global Circulation and Local Dynamics (1840s–1860s) in Response to the Brown Soft-Scale Coccus hesperidum
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is a rather interesting article on the dissemination of coccus hesperidum in the Azores islands (1840-1860), the earliest evidence of a plant pest documented in the Azores having an impressing social and economic impact, specially in São Miguel island. The fact that the archipelago landscape changed dramatically in the 19thcentury with the introduction of several cultures and species from Asia and Brazil, as the black and green tea, the cryptomeria japonica, the pinapple (Ananas comosusL. Merril) - only to mention a few - makes this contribuition even more important.
The authors should be congratulated by making use of a significant corphus of primary sources, namely the reports housed at the ANTT - National Archives of Portugal, printed sources, literature and even travel writings, such as the Bullar brothers and Webster. Therefore the article is very well documented both on a local, national and international level.
The article has, however, some limitations that can be improved:
1 - It will be important for some readers to have an ideia on the importance of the “orange cycle” in terms of importance, revenue and percentage of the total exports before and after the brown soft-scale.
2 - The argument of the reappraisal of Crosby’s model of “Europeanizing” demands for more explanation, especially when considering non specialists in enviromental history. Rather then exploring this idea in the “discussion”, the authors may introduce it more convenientely and explicitly in the previous sections.
Author Response
Thank you for revising my manuscript. Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
I recommend that the author(s) link this case study with the global history of citrus fruits and the diseases that affect them (India, Southern Spain, North America. Second, I recommend that the author analyse to what extend the production of orange controlled by English farmers who lived on Azores made this agents interested in solving this problem.
Small questions could be seen throughout the text,
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Thank you for revising my manuscript. Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
