Influence of Four Spacings between Trees and Four Samplings Heights on Selected Wood Quality Attributes of White Spruce (Picea glauca (Moench) Voss)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Title. The title is appropriate to the subject, informative, and concise.

 

Abstract. The abstract is concise, provides a clear overview, includes essential facts for the paper, and concludes with a final point that places the work described in a broader context.

 

Keywords. These are enough for the topic.

 

Introduction. The introduction includes background to provide an appreciation for the context of the work presented and also states the rationale and problem that the researchers attempted to answer through their experiments.

 

Material and methods.  In this section, the authors describe the correct steps that followed during conducting their study, give precise details of the study design, and how they analyzed the data.

 

Results. This section was well written and shows all data with good descriptions. The results say about the objective that motivates the research, and the authors take a broad look at their findings and examine the work in the larger context of the field.

 

Discussion. The authors had to discuss the data with respect to how their data fit into what is currently known in the field.

 

Conclusion. This section included the major conclusions, which were briefly written.

L465–471 — This information was stated in M&M section, remove it for the conclusion.

 

 

Figures and Tables. Both sections have good information and are necessary for the manuscript. 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Notes in the attachment.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Requirements

11.      Title. “Initial spacing between trees”. It had to put “between trees”, because otherwise it is not possible to understand the kind of space that is taken into consideration. Also, it is not well understood what kind of "initial space" is taken into consideration. These “initial spacings” remained the same throughout their growth period, without any changes, which means that there is no "final spacing". Therefore, the term "initial" is not relevant for the research and can be eliminated. More relevant is the previously mentioned addition regarding the spacing between trees.

22.      Title. All the research refers to two influencing factors, namely the distance between the rows of trees and the height at which the samples are taken for testing. The second problem is not found in the title and must be added. That's why I recommend adding in the title "Influence of four spacings between trees and different heights of samplings on …”

33.      Abstract and more. This part abounds in abbreviations, which does not seem to be a very good thing. There are other journals that do not accept abbreviations in the abstract. Therefore, for a better understanding on the part of the reader, I recommend not to use abbreviations in the abstract. I also recommend that you use these abbreviations sparingly throughout the work. When making conclusions in each chapter, an explicit explanation of the problem is needed, without the use of abbreviations.

44.      Line 37: “boreal forests”. This term can be explained for all readers from the whole planet, or could be replaced with “Canadian forests” or “Nordic forests”.

55.      Line 54: “hydraulic resistance”. This term has many meanings and especially some that do not fit into the context of this work, which is why I recommend changing it

66.      Line 56: “LWP is the key property determining RD value”. So many abbreviations. Personally, in order to be able to understand the content of this work, I made a list of all the abbreviations in the work, so that when an abbreviation appears, I can understand the explanation in the work. You will realize that no reader will act like me, he will lose his patience and will not continue reading the work.

77.      Lines 143-146. In this area, more details should be introduced regarding the general differences between juvenile wood and mature wood on the cross section.

88.      Lines 180 and 188: Equation 1 and 2. Not all the variables of the two equations are explained. Likewise, other comments on the variables of the equations must be arranged in different paragraphs, not in the same paragraph with the explanation of each parameter.

99.      Line 251: Abscises and vertical lines from Fig 1 are not written in Palatino-Linotype. Please, correct them. Also, in the legend of the figure leave only the explanation of each element that appears in the figure, other comments must be presented separately in another paragraph. The same for figures 2 and 3.

110.   Line 409. “Height”. Change the word with small letter: “height”.

111.   Line 445: “This advocates…”. Change this expression with other similar one, because it is mainly used in the juridic field. E.g., It highlights, specifies, … etc.

112.   Lines 450-460. The chapter “Practical implications” does not highlight anything new for the work, and it is good to be removed.

113.   Conclusions: lines 464-461. This expression does not constitute a conclusion, but rather what was investigated in the work. Conclusions of the work must be drawn. The same for 479-481.

114.    Conclusions: All conclusions must be improved.

115.   References. Some journal names are abbreviated (position 60) and others are not (position 55). According to the instructions of the journal FORESTS, all journal names must be abbreviated and respected throughout the list.

116.   The problem of the distance between the rows of trees is of the greatest importance (between 1 and 6 m), which is why it must be given a separate space. I recommend that you have a table in which to evaluate the quantity of logs obtained per hectare at each of the 4 distances taken into consideration (this is the economic part of the problem) and together with the quality characteristics of these logs in the same table. Only in this way it will  be clearly observed if it is worth using a distance of more than 6 m between trees. It is possible that the quality characteristics are not so good at a large distance between the trees. You can even get an optimal distance between the trees. The result of this evaluation must be put to conclusions and, certainly, it will constitute a basic element that will increase the value of the work and will be much more appreciated by the readers.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx