When Human–Wildlife Conflict Turns Deadly: Comparing the Situational Factors That Drive Retaliatory Leopard Killings in South Africa
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
In my opinion this is an interesting study as it is important to report differences of opinions of stakeholder. However, the study has a very small sample size of 16 persons interviewed. It is therefore useful to present the local situation, but not to make general statements. The result section is accordingly too long and difficult to understand, needs to be more synthesised. Given the small sample size, I do not think that in the conclusions such a long discussion about situational crime prevention is necessary. In my opinion you should limit the manuscript to report your findings but not discuss methods. I recommend to much shorten the manuscript. The abbreviations (e.g. H-LC, H-WC, IUU and SCP) are not necessary, the text is better to read if you write these in full.
Some detailed comments:
Line 24. “and/or” is a useless artificial construction, “or” means exactly the same.
Line 100. I do not think you want to write here that leopards eat plants and disperse seeds, needs rewording and citations.
Line 120 and later. Avoid the passive voice as it makes the text imprecise, I guess you chose the area, not someone else.
Figure 1. not clear what the black circles and red triangles are, I guess the cities and conflict areas, but this needs to be clearly stated.
Line 195. What is a “gin trap”?
Table 2-4. the statements in the table are difficult to understand without explanation, needs more context.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer #1,
We would like to thank you for your very constructive feedback on our article. We have made every effort to address your comments, which we believe significantly helped strengthen the article. Attached, please, kindly find our responses to your review.
Sincerely,
Author(s)
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The study is very interesting and may deserve publication. However, it is also based on a very low sample size, which should be increased or at least discussed more than already done. Throughout the text, literature is reported in a slapdash way, i.e. both with numbers and with author names. I suggest authors to follow the instructions for this journal.
Line 33. What do you mean by “1 below 1”?
Line 43. The illegal trade may regard not only species, but also their parts. And CITES bans both species trade and species organ trade (e.g. horns, livers, ecc…).
Lines 54-56. Are you sure? I also think that crop damaging species are widely poached. Please check.
Line 75. Infanticide is killing of cubs? Please define better.
Lines 95-97. I think that human-leopard conflict is also widespread in the Asian range of this felid. Please check.
Lines 103-114. Authors should better define clear aims and clear predictions.
Lines 128-130. Your sample size is very low to drive any definite conclusion. I know that you discussed the low sample size in a whole paragraph, but I am unconvinced about result reliability due to such a low number of interviews. Please increase the number of interviews or at least explain why your results should be considered as reliable. If it is not possible for you to increase sample size, the MS should be shortened by about 50%, avoiding any speculation on the results.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer #2,
We would like to thank you for your very constructive feedback on our article. We have made every effort to address your comments, which we believe significantly helped strengthen the article. Attached, please, kindly find our responses to your review.
Sincerely,
Author(s)
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript has improved a little after revision, but in my opinion, the paper is far too long considering the small sample size. It would still benefit from extensive shortening, especially in the discussion.
Author Response
Thank you for the suggestion. We had already reduced almost 25% of the discussion in our first revision by moving the theoretical framework (discussion on environmental criminology) into the introduction section. We have now removed theory from both sections to make the paper more concise. We have made a significant attempt to shorten the discussion even more by taking into consideration the specific recommendations provided by Reviewer #1. We have reduced the discussion section from approximately 3,400 words to about 1,900 words as part of the second revision.
Reviewer 2 Report
Authors amended the ms, which can now be accepted for publication
Author Response
Thank you for your valuable feedback, which we believe significantly strengthened the paper.
