Grassland Phenology Response to Climate Conditions in Biobio, Chile from 2001 to 2020
, Fernando-Juan Pérez-Porras 2, Paula Triviño-Tarradas 2, Andrés-Felipe Ríos-Mesa 3, Alfonso García-Ferrer Porras 1 and Francisco-Javier Mesas-Carrascosa 2,*Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript "Grassland phenology response to climate conditions in Biobio, Chile from 2001 to 2020" is fascinating whit significant findings in the region. No other similar research I have found for the Biobio areal. Before acceptance please, please accept several suggestions and recommendations detailed in the following lines.
L14-25 – The authors discuss general aspects, and only a sentence presents the results. Please reduce the generalities to one sentence, clarify the method and material, and provide supplementary material with results and one conclusion line.
L29-33 there is only one sentence and is too long; please consider rephrasing.
L36-37 "…..change on vegetation causes changes in the phenological patterns of vegetation such…." Please consider rephrasing.
L101-104 Please add a line with the hypothesis since it was addressed questions.
L107 Please double-check the degree sign from coordinates, and °C appears with an underlined line.
L138-144 The Latin names, please write italic: Avena barbata Pott ex Link, Bromus mollis L. etc.
L171 – please add the following citation to TERRACLIMATE "Abatzoglou, J., Dobrowski, S., Parks, S. et al. TerraClimate, a high-resolution global dataset of monthly climate and climatic water balance from 1958–2015. Sci Data 5, 170191 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2017.191"
Discussion – The Biobio region appear to be subjected to environmental pollution and fire events which can cumulate the effects of climate changes in grassland phenology. Thus, please consider discussing the results in the context of climatic change and include another significant factor in changing NDVI values, as is environmental pollution. I suggested the following studies from your study area and others reported in the world to be included in this chapter as a new paragraph which can explain partially the results obtained:
Barón, E., Gago-Ferrero, P., Gorga, M., Rudolph, I., Mendoza, G., Zapata, A. M., ... & Barceló, D. (2013). Occurrence of hydrophobic organic pollutants (BFRs and UV-filters) in sediments from South America. Chemosphere, 92(3), 309-316.
Sanchez-Hernandez, J. C., Fossi, M. C., Leonzio, C., Focardi, S., Barra, R., Gavilan, J. F., & Parra, O. (1998). Use of biochemical biomarkers as a screening tool to focus the chemical monitoring of organic pollutants in the Biobio river basin (Chile). Chemosphere, 37(4), 699-710.
Rodríguez-Oroz, D., Vidal, R., Fernandoy, F., Lambert, F., & Quiero, F. (2018). Metal concentrations and source identification in Chilean public children's playgrounds. Environmental monitoring and assessment, 190(12), 1-14.
Alonso, Á., Figueroa, R., & Castro-Díez, P. (2017). Pollution assessment of the Biobío River (Chile): Prioritization of substances of concern under an ecotoxicological approach. Environmental management, 59(5), 856-869.
Bravo-Linares, C., Schuller, P., Castillo, A., Salinas-Curinao, A., Ovando-Fuentealba, L., Muñoz-Arcos, E., ... & Dercon, G. (2020). Combining isotopic techniques to assess historical sediment delivery in a forest catchment in central Chile. Journal of Soil Science and Plant Nutrition, 20(1), 83-94.
Wang, S., Zhang, C., Zhan, Y., Zhang, Y., Lou, T., & Xue, F. (2020). Evaluation of ecological risk of heavy metals in watershed soils in the Daxia River Basin. AIP Advances, 10(5), 055109.
D’Emilio, M., Coluzzi, R., Macchiato, M., Imbrenda, V., Ragosta, M., Sabia, S., & Simoniello, T. (2018). Satellite data and soil magnetic susceptibility measurements for heavy metals monitoring: findings from Agri Valley (Southern Italy). Environmental earth sciences, 77(3), 1-7.
Nechita, C., Iordache, A. M., Lemr, K., Levanič, T., & Pluhacek, T. (2021). Evidence of declining trees resilience under long term heavy metal stress combined with climate change heating. Journal of Cleaner Production, 317, 128428.
Fang, A., Bao, M., Chen, W., & Dong, J. (2021). Assessment of Surface Ecological Quality of Grassland Mining Area and Identification of Its Impact Range. Natural Resources Research, 1-19.
Author Response
The manuscript "Grassland phenology response to climate conditions in Biobio, Chile from 2001 to 2020" is fascinating whit significant findings in the region. No other similar research I have found for the Biobio areal. Before acceptance please, please accept several suggestions and recommendations detailed in the following lines.
Thank you for the opportunity to resubmit our manuscript. Our manuscript has benefited greatly from your review, and we appreciate the favorable comments from reviewer. We have revised it to clarify your suggestions. We believe our revised manuscript aligns with your comments.
Those added texts have been marked in yellow.
L14-25 – The authors discuss general aspects, and only a sentence presents the results. Please reduce the generalities to one sentence, clarify the method and material, and provide supplementary material with results and one conclusion line.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 15-29:
Plant phenology is affected by climate conditions and therefore provides a sensitive indicator to changes in climate. Studying the evolution and change of plant phenology aids in a better understanding of, and predicting changes in, ecosystems. Vegetation Indices (VIs) have been recognized for their utility in indicating vegetation activity. Understanding climatic variables and their relationship to VI support the knowledgebase of how ecosystems are changing under a new climatic scenario This study evaluates grassland growth phenology in the Biobio, Chile biweekly with Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) time series. Four growth parameters for the six agro-climatic regions were analyzed from 2001 to 2020: start and end of season, time and value of maximum NDVI. For this purpose, the NDVI time series were smoothed using Savitzky-Golay filtering. In addition, using monthly gridded database climate data we studied correlations between phenology markers and rainfall, maximum temperature, and minimum temperature. The results show that both start and end of growing season did not significantly change, however, all agro-climatic regions grow faster and more vigorously. Thus, climatic conditions in Biobio have become more conducive to grassland growth over the 2001-2020 period.
L29-33 there is only one sentence and is too long; please consider rephrasing.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 33-36:
“Vegetation phenology is the study of biological patterns in plant growth over time, such as germination, flowering, fruiting, lead emergence, etc. Moreover, it examines how these patterns relate to environmental factors, such as rainfall and air temperature, thus providing information about vegetation productivity…”
L36-37 "…..change on vegetation causes changes in the phenological patterns of vegetation such…." Please consider rephrasing.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 40:
“The impact of climate change on vegetation causes variations in the phenological patterns of vegetation such as temporal…”
L101-104 Please add a line with the hypothesis since it was addressed questions.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See line 104:
“The objective of this study was to track phenological changes in Biobio grasslands. The study was carried out with the specific aims:…
L107 Please double-check the degree sign from coordinates, and °C appears with an underlined line.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 110 and 119-120:
“The Biobio Region (Chile) (central coordinates 37° 15’ S, 72° 30’ W, WGS-84) covers an area of 37,068 km2 (Figure 1.a)…
“. Temperature in the warmest month is around 25°C while the coldest month ranges from 0°C to 7°C, with the annual mean temperature equal to 10°C.
L138-144 The Latin names, please write italic: Avena barbata Pott ex Link, Bromus mollis L. etc.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 125-131:
“Avena barbata, Bromus mollis, Hordeum murinum, Aira caryophyllea, Paspalum dilatatatum, Brisa minor, Hypochoeris glabra, Erodium cicutarium, Lolium rigidum, Lolium multiflorum, Trifolium glomeratum and Medicago polymorpha; the sown grassland are composed of Lolium perenne, Lolium multiflorum, Dactilis glomerata, Festuca arundinacea, Phalaris aquatica, Trifolium suterráneum, Trifolium michelianum, Trifolium pratense, Trifolium incarnatum, Trifolium repens, Lotus pedunculatus, Medicago sativa and others [56].”
L171 – please add the following citation to TERRACLIMATE "Abatzoglou, J., Dobrowski, S., Parks, S. et al. TerraClimate, a high-resolution global dataset of monthly climate and climatic water balance from 1958–2015. Sci Data 5, 170191 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2017.191"
Thank you for your suggestion. This reference was included in previous version at line 169. Maybe the confusion was motivated because “Terraclimate” was written in lowercase. In this version we have written name of database in capital letters as in next lines. In addition, Terraclimate first mention is at line 150. We have moved reference at this line and renumbered all references. (Actual reference is number 58)
See line 223:
“…[57] was used as the remote sensing dataset while TERRACLIMATE [58].”
See line 243:
“Monthly climate data of maximum and minimum temperatures as well as rainfall were extracted from the TERRACLIMATE database.”
Discussion – The Biobio region appear to be subjected to environmental pollution and fire events which can cumulate the effects of climate changes in grassland phenology. Thus, please consider discussing the results in the context of climatic change and include another significant factor in changing NDVI values, as is environmental pollution. I suggested the following studies from your study area and others reported in the world to be included in this chapter as a new paragraph which can explain partially the results obtained:
Barón, E., Gago-Ferrero, P., Gorga, M., Rudolph, I., Mendoza, G., Zapata, A. M., ... & Barceló, D. (2013). Occurrence of hydrophobic organic pollutants (BFRs and UV-filters) in sediments from South America. Chemosphere, 92(3), 309-316.
Sanchez-Hernandez, J. C., Fossi, M. C., Leonzio, C., Focardi, S., Barra, R., Gavilan, J. F., & Parra, O. (1998). Use of biochemical biomarkers as a screening tool to focus the chemical monitoring of organic pollutants in the Biobio river basin (Chile). Chemosphere, 37(4), 699-710.
Rodríguez-Oroz, D., Vidal, R., Fernandoy, F., Lambert, F., & Quiero, F. (2018). Metal concentrations and source identification in Chilean public children's playgrounds. Environmental monitoring and assessment, 190(12), 1-14.
Alonso, Á., Figueroa, R., & Castro-Díez, P. (2017). Pollution assessment of the Biobío River (Chile): Prioritization of substances of concern under an ecotoxicological approach. Environmental management, 59(5), 856-869.
Bravo-Linares, C., Schuller, P., Castillo, A., Salinas-Curinao, A., Ovando-Fuentealba, L., Muñoz-Arcos, E., ... & Dercon, G. (2020). Combining isotopic techniques to assess historical sediment delivery in a forest catchment in central Chile. Journal of Soil Science and Plant Nutrition, 20(1), 83-94.
Wang, S., Zhang, C., Zhan, Y., Zhang, Y., Lou, T., & Xue, F. (2020). Evaluation of ecological risk of heavy metals in watershed soils in the Daxia River Basin. AIP Advances, 10(5), 055109.
D’Emilio, M., Coluzzi, R., Macchiato, M., Imbrenda, V., Ragosta, M., Sabia, S., & Simoniello, T. (2018). Satellite data and soil magnetic susceptibility measurements for heavy metals monitoring: findings from Agri Valley (Southern Italy). Environmental earth sciences, 77(3), 1-7.
Nechita, C., Iordache, A. M., Lemr, K., Levanič, T., & Pluhacek, T. (2021). Evidence of declining trees resilience under long term heavy metal stress combined with climate change heating. Journal of Cleaner Production, 317, 128428.
Fang, A., Bao, M., Chen, W., & Dong, J. (2021). Assessment of Surface Ecological Quality of Grassland Mining Area and Identification of Its Impact Range. Natural Resources Research, 1-19.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 484-500:
“On the other hand, variations on climate conditions have an important impact on water balance and material circulation in watersheds. Thus, the influence of climate change on water quality has been previously documented [91,92]. It is assumed that climate change can influence water environments through affecting water flow, pollutant transformation and migration as well as toxicity [93,94]. Moreover, transformation and migration patterns of toxic pollutants in the water environment are complex processes, and the influencing mechanism of climate change on heavy metals is still unknown. Recently, a few studies have demonstrated the impact of meteorological factors on heavy metals using model simulation methods or short-term water quality data [95,96]. High heavy metal concentrations in soils have been cited as one of the factors limiting vegetation establishment and growth in areas suffering high anthropogenic impact [97–99]. Thus, heavy metal toxicity first affects the growth of vegetation roots because they are more sensitive to heavy metal stress. In addition, heavy metal pollution limits root growth and results in decreased root weight [100,101]. Based on previous research in the study area [102–105], future projects should analyze the influence of heavy metal and contaminant concentrations in soil, together with climatic variables and vegetation indices to study changes in the phenology of vegetation, including grasslands.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The article reports the extensive use of data to detect trends in time series. The study is written in a somewhat difficult style, but this is not a crucial problem. However, it is difficult to see the study's novelty, since there are no methodological new insights.
Some minor comments on the text:
page 4 line 150. This is the first mention of Terraclimate, please place reference number (which is 50) here.
page 5, line 190, page 6, line 206. Writing “as in other research” is not usual, please consider writing in other way.
page 8, lines 257 to 262. Variability should be informed for all regions.
page 11 line 347. It is not usual to announce that a result will be presented before another result.
Author Response
The article reports the extensive use of data to detect trends in time series. The study is written in a somewhat difficult style, but this is not a crucial problem. However, it is difficult to see the study's novelty, since there are no methodological new insights.
Thank you for the opportunity to resubmit our manuscript. Our manuscript has benefited greatly from your review, and we appreciate the favorable comments from reviewer.
We agree with you that our study is not based on developing a new methodology. There are indeed other authors who have used these or similar methods in other parts of the world to study changes in phenology. The novelty lies precisely in the location of the study. Thus, changes in climatic conditions have an unequal effect depending on the area of the planet analysed. In our case, to our knowledge, no studies have been carried out using remote sensing to analyse the case of Chile. Thus, most of the studies published to date show an earlier start to the season, but this is not the case in the Biobio region, where the changes are of a different type. We understand that this type of publication helps us to better understand at a global and local level how the climate changes we are experiencing today affect us.
We have revised it to clarify your suggestions. We believe our revised manuscript aligns with your comments. Those added texts have been marked in yellow.
Some minor comments on the text:
page 4 line 150. This is the first mention of Terraclimate, please place reference number (which is 50) here.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See line 223:
“was used as the remote sensing dataset while TERRACLIMATE [58] was used as ..”
page 5, line 190, page 6, line 206. Writing “as in other research” is not usual, please consider writing in other way.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 264:
“Based on previous research [64], grassland phenology for each agro-climatic region was summarized as they are relatively homogeneous both in climate and biological diversity.”
page 8, lines 257 to 262. Variability should be informed for all regions.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 184-190:
“Finally, Secano Interior and Depresión Intermedia have a mean accumulated rainfall equal to 1071 and 1059 mm´year-1 respectively. In addition, the Precordillera, Cordillera and Secano Costero regions present the most variability with a standard deviation equal to ±270.9, 268. and 265 mm´year-1. The Cordón Isla, on the other hand, has the least variability with ±214.0 mm´year-1. Lastly, the Secano Interior and Depresión Intermedia regions have a standard deviation equal to ±244 and 231 mm´year-1 respectively.”
page 11 line 347. It is not usual to announce that a result will be presented before another result.
Your suggestion has been taken into account and the sentence has been removed.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This is a simple study, having minor scientific contribution as not ground-truth data were utilized. There is no novelty regarding the methodology and the study has a character of a case study. However, the manuscript is relatively well-structured and straightforward. I consider that it should be acceptable for publication after a major review.
Some specific results and implications of the study should be added in the Abstract.
A few references and sentences regarding successful application of MODIS images for similar study objective should be added in the Introduction. Paragraphs in lines 84-95 are misplaced and should be integrated in the first paragraph of the Introduction.
Paragraph in lines 117-134 should be presented with a figure (or a subfigure in Figure 1), as it is not very representative and clear in this format.
The entire subsection 3.1. (along with figures 3 and 4) should not be a part of the Results section. The simple interpretation of climate data (which you did not produce in this study) is completely misplaced here. I definitely suggest removing this paragraph from the Results and adding a much shorter version to the 2.1. subsection regarding the study area (as you actually describe existing conditions in the study area).
The Discussion section requires significant improvement, most notably regarding the comparison to the previous studies and adding these references. As this study has a character of a case study, this improvement must be substantial to justify its publication in the scientific journal.
Specific comments:
Lines 15-16: Please rephrase this sentence to make it more fluid.
Lines 29-33: This sentence is unreadable and must be split into two or three shorter sentences.
Lines 96-101: This part should be removed, as it is basically a rough abstract of the methods used.
Line 149: This is not a correct full name of NDVI.
Figure 2 should be presented in higher dpi.
Author Response
The article reports the extensive use of data to detect trends in time series. The study is written in a somewhat difficult style, but this is not a crucial problem. However, it is difficult to see the study's novelty, since there are no methodological new insights.
Thank you for the opportunity to resubmit our manuscript. Our manuscript has benefited greatly from your review, and we appreciate the favorable comments from reviewer.
We agree with you that our study is not based on developing a new methodology. There are indeed other authors who have used these or similar methods in other parts of the world to study changes in phenology. The novelty lies precisely in the location of the study. Thus, changes in climatic conditions have an unequal effect depending on the area of the planet analysed. In our case, to our knowledge, no studies have been carried out using remote sensing to analyse the case of Chile. Thus, most of the studies published to date show an earlier start to the season, but this is not the case in the Biobio region, where the changes are of a different type. We understand that this type of publication helps us to better understand at a global and local level how the climate changes we are experiencing today affect us.
We have revised it to clarify your suggestions. We believe our revised manuscript aligns with your comments. Those added texts have been marked in yellow.
Some minor comments on the text:
page 4 line 150. This is the first mention of Terraclimate, please place reference number (which is 50) here.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See line 224:
“was used as the remote sensing dataset while TERRACLIMATE [58] was used as ..”
page 5, line 190, page 6, line 206. Writing “as in other research” is not usual, please consider writing in other way.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 265:
“Based on previous research [64], grassland phenology for each agro-climatic region was summarized as they are relatively homogeneous both in climate and biological diversity.”
page 8, lines 257 to 262. Variability should be informed for all regions.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 185-191:
“Finally, Secano Interior and Depresión Intermedia have a mean accumulated rainfall equal to 1071 and 1059 mm´year-1 respectively. In addition, the Precordillera, Cordillera and Secano Costero regions present the most variability with a standard deviation equal to ±270.9, 268. and 265 mm´year-1. The Cordón Isla, on the other hand, has the least variability with ±214.0 mm´year-1. Lastly, the Secano Interior and Depresión Intermedia regions have a standard deviation equal to ±244 and 231 mm´year-1 respectively.”
page 11 line 347. It is not usual to announce that a result will be presented before another result.
Your suggestion has been taken into account and the sentence has been removed.
REVIEWER 3
This is a simple study, having minor scientific contribution as not ground-truth data were utilized. There is no novelty regarding the methodology and the study has a character of a case study. However, the manuscript is relatively well-structured and straightforward. I consider that it should be acceptable for publication after a major review.
Thank you for the opportunity to resubmit our manuscript. Our manuscript has benefited greatly from your review, and we appreciate the favorable comments from reviewer.
We have revised it to clarify your suggestions. We believe our revised manuscript aligns with your comments. Those added texts have been marked in yellow.
Some specific results and implications of the study should be added in the Abstract.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 15-29:
“Plant phenology is affected by climate conditions and therefore provides a sensitive indicator to changes in climate. Studying the evolution and change of plant phenology aids in a better understanding of, and predicting changes in, ecosystems. Vegetation Indices (VIs) have been recognized for their utility in indicating vegetation activity. Understanding climatic variables and their relationship to VI support the knowledgebase of how ecosystems are changing under a new climatic scenario This study evaluates grassland growth phenology in the Biobio, Chile biweekly with Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) time series. Four growth parameters for the six agro-climatic regions were analyzed from 2001 to 2020: start and end of season, time and value of maximum NDVI. For this purpose, the NDVI time series were smoothed using Savitzky-Golay filtering. In addition, using monthly gridded database climate data we studied correlations between phenology markers and rainfall, maximum temperature, and minimum temperature. The results show that both start and end of growing season did not significantly change, however, all agro-climatic regions grow faster and more vigorously. Thus, climatic conditions in Biobio have become more conducive to grassland growth over the 2001-2020 period.”
A few references and sentences regarding successful application of MODIS images for similar study objective should be added in the Introduction. Paragraphs in lines 84-95 are misplaced and should be integrated in the first paragraph of the Introduction.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 88-92:
“Of all the Earth observation projects, products obtained from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) are the most efficient to develop long-terms time series of vegetation phenology [38]. MODIS vegetation products are used to monitor phenology of forestall [39–41] and agricultural [42,43] ecosystems, drought monitoring [44,45] and classify crop species [46].”
Moreover, lines 84-95 have been moved at the beginning of the introduction. See lines 45-56.
Paragraph in lines 117-134 should be presented with a figure (or a subfigure in Figure 1), as it is not very representative and clear in this format.
Because there is an specific subsection (Section 2.1) about climatic variables where figures are included we have decided to remove this lines in this new version. In addition, it is a synthetic description which does not provide any information of value to be highlighted.
In addition, the names of the agro-climatic regions have been moved to lines 111-113.
The entire subsection 3.1. (along with figures 3 and 4) should not be a part of the Results section. The simple interpretation of climate data (which you did not produce in this study) is completely misplaced here. I definitely suggest removing this paragraph from the Results and adding a much shorter version to the 2.1. subsection regarding the study area (as you actually describe existing conditions in the study area).
We have moved this section to Materials and Methods. The other reviewers have positively valued the use of these data and its explanation; therefore we have maintained its extension. We trust that you will understand our decision.
The Discussion section requires significant improvement, most notably regarding the comparison to the previous studies and adding these references. As this study has a character of a case study, this improvement must be substantial to justify its publication in the scientific journal.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. In addition, we have included a paragraph about heavy metals and pollutants on soils based on reviewer1’s comments.
See lines 423-443:
“Phenological observations provide localized information with high temporal resolutions in different biological phases. Phenology varies over geographic gradients according to climate zone and vegetation type. Phenology also varies within communities, and the phenology of individual plants plays a key role in determining how ecosystems are structured and how they function [70]. Temperate forest trends are attributed to warming temperatures [23,71]. In addition, boreal and subalpine forests show similar trends to those observed in temperate forests which are attributed to a warning climate [72,73], moreover, there is little evidence that rainfall has a significant influence on boreal forest phenology [74]. In Subalpine meadows and Artic and alpine tundras, in high latitudes and high altitude ecosystems, there are two main factors that regulate SOS, the timing of snowmelt and the temperatures that follow [75] while warm might delay EOS [76], however, it has not been extensively studied. On the other hand, the impacts of climate change on tropical forests vary across regional-to-continental scales. Decreasing precipitation and reduced cloudiness in Amazonia may result in different phenological shifts than, for example, in central Africa where precipitation is projected to increase [77]. Mediterranean areas include a diverse range of plant types, and phenological responses to environmental cues vary accordingly. Temperature is a key factor for most species, but rainfall, through its influence on soil moisture, is also important [78,79]. Finally, in subtropical desert ecosystems, phenological variations resulting from climate change may occur due to changes in the timing and quantity of rainfall, and increases in temperature[80]. Therefore, phenology varies over geographic gradients, according to climate zone and vegetation type.”
Specific comments:
Lines 15-16: Please rephrase this sentence to make it more fluid.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 15-16:
“Plant phenology is affected by climate conditions and therefore provides a sensitive indicator to changes in climate”
Lines 29-33: This sentence is unreadable and must be split into two or three shorter sentences.
Your suggestion has been taken into account. See lines 33-35:
“Vegetation phenology is the study of biological patterns in plant growth over time, such as germination, flowering, fruiting, lead emergence, etc. Moreover, it examines how these patterns relate to environmental factors,..”
Lines 96-101: This part should be removed, as it is basically a rough abstract of the methods used.
Your suggestion has been taken into account; these lines have been removed.
Line 149: This is not a correct full name of NDVI.
We apologise for the error; it has been corrected. See line 222:
“Figure 2 summarizes the methodology applied to this research. MODIS MOD13Q1 normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) [57] was …”
Figure 2 should be presented in higher dpi.
Your suggestion has been taken into account and dpi has been increased to double.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear authors,
Although the work has been substantial, the improvements in the article are significant.
Congratulations on the topic and the efforts made.
Reviewer 2 Report
I'm glad to see that my suggestions were followed. Some improvements in writing would still be necessary, as, for example, at the beginning of Discussion. However, this paper was greatly improved and is recommended for publication.
Reviewer 3 Report
The authors performed adequate corrections in the manuscript according to my previous comments. I have no more suggestions to add.
