Irrigation, Water Deficit and Crop Load Effects on ‘Hass’ Avocado Fruit Size Under New Zealand Growing Conditions
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsPlease see the attachment.
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1. How about the groundwater depth of the study area? Weather the groundwater recharge was considered when calculating the irrigation water volume in Equation (1)?
2. In Figure 1, I think the unit of Y label of rainfall should be mm.
3. In Table 1, the irrigation period was from November to March, so this irrigation schedule was carried out every year? which year to which year? How about the soil water content during April to September? The irrigation was not carried out during this period or the soil water content will not decrease to 0.4 m3/m3?
4. I noticed that “irrigation applied for 6 8 hours when soil water content dropped below 0.4 m3/m3”, so how about the soil water retention characteristics of study area, such as field capacity and saturated moisture content. In another words, how did 0.4 m3/m3 was determined for irrigation lower limit?
5. Irrigation is the main experimental factor in this study, while in table the irrigation treatment was not set during year 0 (year 2016 2017). Besides, in Line 150 151, “the experiment was established during that summer, and irrigation treatments did not start until mid summer”, so why take this period (year 2016 2017) as the study period, I think the research period were only year 1 and year 2 in this study.
6. 2.1. Study site and plant materials should be “study site” only.
7. From 2.4 weather to 2.9 Stomatal conductance, all these parts should be classified as data observation or measurement in Materials and Method.
8. By the way, I only noticed the irrigation treatment in this part, how does “water deficit” and “crop load” was considered or set as an experiment factor in this study?
9. Results, I think in this study, the weather data should be regarded as basic information, so it should not be analyzed as experimental data here. It would be better to show in Materials and Method part.
10. In the part of “3.2 soil water content”, it is the description and data analysis about Figure 2 in “3.1 Weather”, I think it is unreasonable. Besides, it was shown in Figure 3 that “the values obtained from tensiometer values was well simulated with the data from soil moisture probes recorded at the same time”. While, both tensiometer and soil moisture probes can measure soil water content, so why this part of the content placed in the data analysis section?
11. The data in Figure 4 were not collected from the same measurement period. They were therefore not comparable and cannot provide relevant information.
12. In Figure 5, the scale of stomatal conductance was the same for all subfigures, please use the same scale for VPD, it would be convenient to compare the lines.
13. Usually, the stomatal conductance varied opposite to VPD, while on 05FEB19, it increased with VPD increase from 13:00 to 14:00, and it decreased with VPD decrease from 14:00 to 15:00 under irrigated ones. Please explain.
14. The irrigation was not carried out until mid summer of year 2017, while the fruit at harvest on 2 October 2017 (Year 0) can not be considered as the results of this study. I think the fruit yield should be measured in year 2018 and year 2019. By the way, how about the data difference between irrigated ones and non irrigated ones? For the fruit yield, I think the unit should be kg/ha instead of kg.
15. The similar problem in Figure 7, Do we have the treatments of irrigated and non--irrigated in Year 0 (year 2017)? As the irrigation was carried out after the fruit was harvested.
16. I noticed a higher fruit yield under Non--irrigation in Year 2018, please explain.
17. Line 434 to Line 436, I think the fruit production was not calculated in year 2 of this study, it seems like it only has one--year fruit yield (year 2018) after treated with different irrigation, so why we have such discussion. So, the following discussion about air temperature was out of the question. The discussion should be based on the results obtained in this study.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors conducted a simple experiment with one avocado variety, with only irrigation and a control without irrigation. It's good that the authors observed avocado yields over two years. The abstract should include information that fruit yield was higher without irrigation. The introduction should describe the size or value of avocado cultivation in New Zealand and why this variety was selected for the study. The tree arrangement in the experiment is unclear, meaning that trees were paired, how many trees constituted a single replicate, and how many trees served as a buffer. The methodology lacks information on soil conditions, fertilization, care, and protection, which have a significant impact on fruit tree yield. The description of the results should include information on whether the differences between treatments were significant or not (that's why statistics are used). The discussion ignores the fact that irrigation reduced yield and the impact of yield on fruit size and other characteristics. This should be justified and the results of other authors should be cited.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe most important point is to supplement the soil water retention characteristics of study area, such as field water capacity and saturated soil moisture, as well as the soil texture.
The detailed comments in the attachment.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors have made numerous additions to the publication regarding methodology, description of results, and discussion. In its current form, the publication is suitable for further editorial processing.
Author Response
No additional changes have been requested by this Reviewer
