PCLM-D-25-00063

Trade-offs associated with higher winter wheat yields in low soil organic matter cropping systems under climate change

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Michel,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Climate. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

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Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

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1. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria?>

Reviewer #1: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?-->?>

Reviewer #1: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)??>

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Reviewer #1: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English??>

Reviewer #1: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Dear Author and Editors,

Thank you for the opportunity for reviewing of a manuscript. Here are the impressions on your work. The manuscript "Trade-offs associated with higher winter wheat yields in low soil organic matter cropping systems under climate change" deals with interesting topic and gave insight into potential winter wheat cropping challenges within the 3 scenarios. The original idea is interesting and appears that manuscript has been successful in developing and verifying the aim of the study. In general, this study is based upon a complex research work, the series of the experiments in ecotron which mostly can reflect the real situation with some limitation that are clearly presented. The experimental setting is satisfactory, well established, so the results are comparable to other studies with similar objectives. The assessed paper has an appropriate length and the language fully satisfied the requirement of the publisher. The only dilemma I have is that the year 2013 is taken because that way we are kind of going back in time and since 2013 there have been at least 10 years that have been very challenging for agriculture in terms of climate and have moved things for the worse. I would also suggest changing the title because I don't think it's explained how organic matter content affected yield performance. The only rational explanation is that the 2% content is in fact optimal and that increasing to 4% does not significantly affect the yield. Please find below some specific comments.

LINE 54: “and is the third most cultivated cereal in the world after rice” Area or production ? Globally winter wheat covers the largest area follow with the maize and rice ...please check global importance of the winter wheat. The significance can be derived from the area and from total production

LINE 61:”increase yield to feed a growing world population” - The meaning of this sentence in unclear. In EU 30% of wheat is cultivated compared to global areas. Whether this assumption applies to the EU or globally. Winter wheat alone cannot be single solution but rather a part of the solution.

LINE 64: “The optimal growth temperature for common winter wheat is 21°C. ” - It depends on the growth stage - specify the growth stage. Please specify growing stage, modify the sentence

LINE 68: …” with more (+140 mm) but unequally distributed rain and elevated CO2 concentrations +375…” this is unclear sentence and confusing - elevated from which level ? Currently CO2 is 427ppm.

LINE 111-112: Please explain why those 3 scenarios were chosen. What are their advantages and was it possible to choose other years for comparison with similar research.

LINE 135-136: “….until final harvest for realistic estimation of yield components and the other half was sampled repeatedly during the experiment. “How this 4 modality was selected among 8 replicates and when those treatments are identified. Have you consider side effect to the plants grown at edges of ecotron cubes ?

LINE 169: Does the ecotron simulated suitable photoperiod for winter wheat growing and period of low temperatures

LINE 216 – 218…230-231: Cover crops were grown in the break of two wheat growing seasons. Have you considered the amount of nutrients that were added to the soil on that occasion? It would also be interesting to know the soil moisture (m/m %) (evapotranspiration) on different modalities and types of soil. Please elaborate a bit more about the soil management to be understandable for wider audience as you mention that standard and reduced tillage was applied regularly.

LINE 220-221: Have you considered comparing soil properties before and after the experiment?

LINE 268-269: “…..function of the mineral N measured in the different soils at the end of winter.” according to the values shown, the content of NO3 in the soil is relatively low, or less than 2 kg N-NO3 ha-1 especially for the year 2013, do you have any explanation for that situation

LINE 354-356: “Plants in 2068 were harvested first in early July, followed by 2085 in late July, while 2013 was harvested beginning of August (all dates refer to Ecotron months).” If the plants are maturing faster that imply 2085 first follow with 2068 and 2013. Please check

LINE 393-395: TRL was measured only for 0-10cm this seems too low for winter wheat

LINE 419-422: This is a rather surprising result. Did you compare the yield per single plant, i.e. was the number of plants in the harvest maintained and approximately the same as at the beginning of the growing season?

LINE 430-432: This is the key message of the work. I would eventually add that with an increase in temperature and CO2, the competition between microorganisms and plants increases in favor of microorganisms ??? Is that a message?

LINE 547: “...and identifying wheat varieties with shorter maturation cycles.“Maybe the opposite could be better strategy if you use short cycle varieties the vegetation could be even shorter but if you want to expand growing period varieties with longer vegetation can be also an option

LINE 576-577: “...soil management practices...“ I believe that the work did not vary the different methods of growing wheat, but the fertility of the soil

LINE 581-582: this topic was not discussed to a significant extent in the paper/discussion, so I would not support the authors to put it in a conclusion

I recommend the authors to harmonize the way of citing the literature in the literature section, especially how to write the names of the journals and citing the doi and numbers, following the instructions for writing the paper.

Kind regards

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Reviewer #1: No

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Trade-offs between agronomic yields and sustainability in winter wheat cropping systems under climate change mediated by soil organic matter content

PCLM-D-25-00063R1

Dear Dr.Jennifer Michel,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Trade-offs between agronomic yields and sustainability in winter wheat cropping systems under climate change mediated by soil organic matter content' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Climate.

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Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Climate.

Best regards,

Girma Gezimu Gebre, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

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