The Impact of Early Basal Leaf Removal at Different Sides of the Canopy on Aglianico Grape Quality
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript “The impact of early leaf removal at different side of canopy on Aglianico grape quality” is an interesting study in relation to the effects of basal leaf removal on the content of phenolic compounds in grapes harvested from grapevines growing under warm climate conditions. However, the work is not well written, and the results should be better explained by referring to the bibliography and establishing relationships based on the effects of the treatments on the physiology of the plant. In my opinion, the level of English must be improved in whole the manuscript to be published in Agriculture. To my opinion, the manuscript needs major revisions to be published this in Agriculture.
Title
L2-3: Title should explain the phenological moment and the position in which leaf removal was applied
Abstract
L11-12: Please, explain a little the reasons why this is occurred.
L13: Basal or apical leaf removal? Please, be more retailer.
L13: Three different cluster zones should be better explained. Is it in relation to cluster or the clusters exposed in a respective row?
L14: I think is better to say trained to vertical shoot position system and oriented to EW.
L19: Is that South and North sides correspond to leaf remotion of whole plant?
L19-20: Is that this refers to interaction between factors that significantly affected the content of anthocyanins?
L21: Please, edit by "caused an increase of malvidin-3-O-glucoside content in grapes"
L22: Please, indicate the level of leaf removal. i.e.: 6 basal leaves.
L22: Please, indicate the stage according to a published phenological stage
L23-24: Please, describe the viticultural conditions of the vineyards. i.e. an effective strategy in vineyards cultivated under cold or warm climate conditions.
Introduction
-L34-35: Please improve this sentence since is some hard to understand.
-L35-38: Idem. Please divide the ideas using points.
-L46: It is of wide importance to add the moment of shoot thinning in which was applied.
-L54: Please, edit “Improved” by “Improving”.
-L54-56: The effects explained depends on severity and moment of basal leaf removal. Please, define it for a correct explanation.
-L69: Please, edit this sentence for a better understanding (against reducing).
-L71: Please, replace “microclimates” by “microclimate”.
-L72-73: Please, edit this sentence for a better understanding.
-L81-84: Please, add the references of these interesting findings.
-L86-87: Please, edit this sentence for a better understanding.
-L95-96: I think this sentence could be explained and described better for the understanding of the sentence (north, south, north to south canopy).
-L97: Season or vintage is better to define in viticutural studies.
-L98: I think it is better to say: on vines trained to shoot vertical position system
Materials and Methods
-L118: Chemical fertility should be explained better or be deleted.
-L119: Please, add the phenological stage in which the treatments were performed.
-L119-120: “four early cluster zone leaf removal” should be eliminated.
-L122-125: Sun exposure of clusters should be indicated in parentheses. For example, Treatment 1 (bunches exposed to the afternoon sun). Treatment 2 (bunches exposed to the morning sun).
-L125: Is NS: 100% a leaf basal removal of both sides of plant? If it is correct, I suggest modifying the name of this treatment for a better understanding and to replace in whole document.
-L126-127: I think this is not correct, please, define better the number of plants per treatment and by replicate.
-L128-129: According to the level of rainfall exposed in results and discussion section, the grapevines not received the same water supply.
-L160: “assessed by HPLC” should be deleted in whole document with the exception of its analytical section.
Results and discussion
-L165: How this data was obtained? It is of wide importance to add a paragraph in material and method sections to describe how was obtained climatic data.
-L186: What about with cluster weight?
-L186: The authors must provide an explanation about the differences of LR on leaf area per vine and the interaction of factors on this variable.
-L196: This information is not provided in the Table. Please, edited it for a better understanding.
-L197: What satisfactory values mean? Please, provide a better description.
-L198-200: Please, edit this sentence for a better understanding. In addition, the comparison of the results with the wrote reference should be deleted.
-L207-209: The authors should explain in more detail the results of the study associating the climatic variables and the treatments in the physicochemical and phenolic composition of the berry.
-L255-256: Please, edit this sentence for a better understanding and relace black by red varieties.
-L257: “assessed by HPLC” expression should be evited if it is not mentioned in material and methods section.
-L292-293: The results should be better explained using scientific literature and relating the variables analyzed.
Discussion
-L301-315: The conclusions should be rewriting since are difficult to understand. In addition, the conclusions must be in accordance with the results showed.
References: Take care of the format of the references and also of the abbreviation of the journals.
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Reviewer 2 Report
The proposed article is of interest in the field and captures a less studied aspect, namely the impact of early leaf removal on grape quality.
Leaf removal can be useful tool to achieve a good ripeness level and optimal concentration of phenolic compounds, but these are dependent on the climatic conditions, factors well specified in the article.
The details for phenolic compounds identification and quantification are not included in this report. Details related to the instrumentation are reported in the materials and methods but not details of how the data was processed. There was no mention of standard compounds for the studied phenolics identification or quantification nor is there any details on how identification was approached.
Many data are presented and a lot of correlations can be made between the results obtained and the climatic conditions and / or the leaf removal.
For example, it would be interesting to have a short explanation about the fact that removal on South canopy caused significant increase of P, TP, AA and decrease of FRV/P, whereas removal at North-South increase the FRV and P concentrations.
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
It is a good study and I enjoyed reading the paper. However, there are minor linguistic corrections and the list is attached. Figures 1 and 2 should be redone to appear at least 300 DPI. A figure to show separation and quantification of anthocyanins and other phenols must be introduced. An LC/MS data for the identification of the anthocyanins should be recorded.
The title should be changed to "The impact of early leaf removal at different sides of the canopy on Aglianico grape quality"
Line 32: compromises, change to compromise; in skin—change to the skin
Line 34: strong effects, change to strong effect
Line 49: phenolic substances at harvest increased---change to phenolic substances increased at harvest.
Line 49: On Bobal and Tempranillo varieties----change to in Bobal and Tempranillo varieties…
Line 56: weight was decreased--- change to, weight decreased
Line 58: after the treatments—change to, after the treatment
Line 64: and the improvement of wine—change to, and an improvement of wine
Line 65: without yield decrease—change to, without a decrease in yield
Line 75: compared with control vine [19,20]. Change to compared with the control vines
Line 83: due to decrease of malic acid content---change to, due to a decrease in malic acid content.
Line 85: due to increased UV rays in the cluster, change to-- due to an increased UV radiation in the cluster zone that may favorably affect phenolic production
Line 87: early leaf removal makes more stable wine polyphenols content [17-20,22]---change to, early leaf removal stabilizes wine (vine) polyphenol content
Line 90: leaf removal on Aglianico vines, change to leaf removal from Aglianico vines
Line 93-94: two different intensity of trimming or defoliation on Aglianico vines, change to---two different intensities of trimming or defoliation from Aglianico vines at harvest, caused a decrease in berry total soluble solids and alcohol content in the related wine (vine) [25].
Line 180: Leaf removal treatment----change to---Leaf detachment treatment removed
Line 182: total leaf area per vine respect to control, change to-----total leaf area per vine compared with control
Table 2 In the case of leaf removal from North, cluster number and yield do not change significantly but cluster weight is the highest compared with other groups. Any explanation for this?
Fig. 1 & 2 The labels C, N, S, and NS, are hardly distinguishable in the graphs. Can these be made easily readable? The Y-axis text font should be made bigger to make them readable after print.
Since the paper is being published towards the end of 2020, the citation list should be revised to include the latest references.
- Labanca et al. 2020, New insights into the exploitation of Vitis vinifera L. cv. Aglianico leaf extract of nutraceutical purposes.
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
Review
The impact of early leaf removal at different side of canopy on Aglianico grape quality
General comments
This is a well conducted study that, while looks well conducted and planned on paper, needs a lot of wort to improve and many clarifications to be made before is considered for publication.
In this study, Aglianico grapes from Castel del Monte DOCG were submitted to leaf removal in the south, north and south-north side of the canopies, plus a control treatment (no leaf removal). Importantly, the study was replicated in 3 different vintages, 2016, 2017 and 2018 which makes the study very robust. But I have to remind the authors that this article is about leaf removal (and not about vintage effects on phenolics).
The main conclusion, though, is that there is a strong vintage/season effect on most phenolic parameters. This is expected and not new. However, there are more erratic and less consistent effects of leaf removal on phenolic composition. When there was an effect of leaf removal on phenolic content (including anthocyanins and others) these effects were of relatively small magnitude and unlike to be of sensory relevance in the finished wines (the authors analyzed grapes but not wines, which is another limitation of this study). At the bare minimum, the authors should discuss that these differences in some leaf removal treatments are relatively minor and it remains to be seen if they translate into wine . it is very important for the authors that stress and discuss the fact that wine was not made out of these grapes and that only grapes were analyzed.
Finally, as it will be evident from my specific comments below, this article needs serious edition in written English. Please have a native speaker English proficient person to edit this article.
The authors need to address and incorporate all these general and specific comments before the paper is suitable for publication.
Specific comments
Line 11: replace “solar light” by “sunlight”.
14: EW is east west
14-15: please specify which ones were these 3 zones for leave removal? One was south, the other north and the other?
53: again, not solar light, but sunlight
98: please confirm that what the authors call “espalier” is the same as vertical shoot positioning or VSP in short.
101-103: is Aglianico permitted in the Castel del Monte DOCG? I know the permitted varieites are Negroamaro, Primitivo and Bombino nero and Uva di Troia, but not sure if Aglianico is permitted in Castel del Monte DOCG. Please clarify.
137: provide manufacturer of pH meter
131-136: how much fruit was harvested from each replicate in each of the four treatment’s ? please clarify. It is important to know how much fruit was harvested and how it was manipulated prior to analysis.
147: is not “HPLC-PAD” but “HPLC-DAD” , please correc
152-153: how the fruit was processed for anthocyanin analysis? In other words, how anthocyanins were extracted from the fruit for HPLC analysis ? also, when expressing the results on a Kg basis I assume this is fresh weight basis ? please clarify if this is fresh weight basis and how the anthocyanins from the fruit were extracted for HPLC analysis.
Table 3: the large amounts of acronysms on each colum makes interpretation of the table difficult, please spell out most or as many possible the column headings (instead of TA use titratable acidity, etc).
193-209: this whole section discusses the effect of the vintage/season but this is not the main objective of the present work. While it is clear that there is a clear vintage /season effect, this needs to be said more succinctly, since this work is about leaf removal (not vintage effect) consequently this paragraph needs to be condensed to the smallest possible length.
In figure 1, the figure symbols are too small to be seen and interpreted.
248, 251: spell out “leaf removal” do not use LR
255: these are not “linked to tannins anthocyanins” but they are call either “bound anthocyanins” or polymeric pigments, please check this work:
Extraction, Evolution, and Sensory Impact of Phenolic Compounds During Red Wine Maceration
Annual Review of Food Science and Technology, Vol. 5:83-109 (Volume publication date February 2014)
Figure 2, again symbols are much too small and hard to see each treatment, please enlarge symbols and use colored lines
302-303: this is not clear, see my comments in the “general comments” section. The effects of leaf removal on anthocyanins are marginal and erratic, not following a clear trend and wine was not made so it can not be unequivocally ascertained that the effects of leaf removal on quality were of significant magnitude. The marginal improvement in anthocyanins on the grapes may not be sufficient to offset the cost of labor of doing the leaf removal and the authors should discuss this. They should discuss that there is cost of labor associated with leaf removal.
306: it is not “residue” leaf area but “remaining” leaf area.
309: is not “endowment’ but “content’ or “concentration” of phenolics
In the references section, the references do not seem to be in the same format. For instance, why DOI is provided for certain articles but not for all the cited articles? References need to be in the same format.
Author Response
"Please see the attachment"
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have corrected most of the suggestions performed by this reviewer.
Author Response
Thanks for your relevant comments and suggestions.
Your sincerely
Luigi Tarricone
Reviewer 4 Report
line 131: is east-west orientation a regular row orientation in Castel del Monte DOCG ? is there a reason for that? such orientation maximizes both morning and afternoon sun solely on the south side of the canopy but no exposure on the north side and potentially more heterogeneity. I am right ? please confirm and explain in the manuscript .
line 140: why mediterranean is in italics ?
248: again (I have mentioned this before) this is poor use of English language.it should not be "detachment" you are not detaching leaves, you are doing leaf pulling or leaf removal, thats the way is called by viticulturists around the world
in figure 2, the chromatogram is cut half way, that is , what I believe is the major anthocyanin peak, most likely malvidin 3 glucoside, is not showing up in full please add a full chromatogram
Author Response
Thanks for your relevant comments and suggestions
Your sincerely
Luigi Tarricone
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
