Vegetation Structure and Invertebrate Food Availability for Birds in Intensively Used Arable Fields: Evaluation of Three Widespread Crops
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)
In my opinion, this manuscript ix ready to be published. It is very well written, objectives are clear and methods are appropriate to accomplish them. Results are well presented. A minor thing, legend of figure 4 needs to be moved to the bottom of the figure. Discussion is excellent. Congratulations to the authors for this great work.
Author Response
A minor thing, legend of figure 4 needs to be moved to the bottom of the figure.
Thank you, we we modified the legend according to journal formatting.
Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)
See attachment
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)
Dear Authors,
I read with interest your manuscipt entitled "Vegetation structure and invertebrate food availability for birds in intensively used arable fields: evaluation of three widespread crops".
The manuscript deals with a very important issue. You state that similar articles have been published mainly in Western Europe. However, as I see, it is gratifying that in recent years similar articles have been appearing in increasing numbers in Central-Eastern Europe as well.
I found the article to be suitable for publication in all respects. The language, the number and relevance of the articles cited, the presentation and evaluation of the results are all appropriate.
One minor point is that the captions in Figure 5 are not readable, the size of the figures should be increased.
Author Response
One minor point is that the captions in Figure 5 are not readable, the size of the figures should be increased.
Thank you, we enlarged the font in the graphs to make them easier to read.
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The study addresses a topic of great importance for the conservation of insectivorous birds in eastern Europe. It evaluates three types of crops (maize, rapeseed, and winter wheat), their vegetation structure, as well as the diversity, abundance, and biomass of invertebrates found in those crops over several months. Furthermore, the same parameters of the invertebrates are evaluated in relation to the position within the crop (near and far from the edge). The manuscript is very well written and has a good sampling design. I believe that statistical analyzes could be improved by using statistical distributions that fit the data instead of modifying the data to fit a normal distribution. The presentation of the results is good, but some details can be improved, mainly in the tables and figures. The discussion seemed excellent to me. Please find specific comments in the attached document.