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Responses to editor and reviewers

We highly appreciate the valuable comments and suggestions by the editor and reviewers on our manuscript. We have attempted to address each point. Some sentences have been revised or rewritten to improve the English. The following are our detail responses with reference to the order of the comments.

Part 1: Point-by-point response to Comments by the editor.

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’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.

Re. Thanks for the positive comments. We believe this manuscript has important guiding significance in afforestation in karst area. And we revised the manuscript according to the editor and reviewers.

The study has value but the manuscript has some problems as suggested by the reviewers. The authors should respond to the comments of the reviewers one by one and revise the manuscript accordingly. The revised manuscript might be sent to the reviewers for further reviewing.

Re. Thanks a lot. And we revised the manuscript and respond to the comments of the reviewers one by one.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jan 15 2023 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

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Re. Thanks for your suggestions. We have revised the file label according to the requirements.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

Re. Thank you for reminding me. We have revised the financial disclosure. The specific information has been updated in our manuscript and cover letter.

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Jian Liu

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Re. Thank you. We have revised the file name according to PLOS ONE's style requirements.

2. We note that the grant information you provided in the ‘Funding Information’ and ‘Financial Disclosure’ sections do not match.

Re. We are so sorry to make this mistake and we have revised the “Funding Information” and “Financial Disclosure”.

When you resubmit, please ensure that you provide the correct grant numbers for the awards you received for your study in the ‘Funding Information’ section.

Re. Thanks! We have revised the grant numbers in the Funding Information section.

3. Thank you for stating the following financial disclosure:

"The author(s) received no specific funding for this work."

At this time, please address the following queries:

a) Please clarify the sources of funding (financial or material support) for your study. List the grants or organizations that supported your study, including funding received from your institution.

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Please include your amended statements within your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

Re. Thanks! And we have amended statements in our cover letter.

4. Thank you for stating the following in your Competing Interests section:

"NO authors have competing interests"

Re. Ok. We revised the state in this part.

Please complete your Competing Interests on the online submission form to state any Competing Interests. If you have no competing interests, please state ""The authors have declared that no competing interests exist."", as detailed online in our guide for authors at http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submit-now

This information should be included in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

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Re. Ok. We will upload our study’s minimal underlying data set as either Supporting Information files.

We will update your Data Availability statement to reflect the information you provide in your cover letter.

6. PLOS requires an ORCID iD for the corresponding author in Editorial Manager on papers submitted after December 6th, 2016. Please ensure that you have an ORCID iD and that it is validated in Editorial Manager. To do this, go to ‘Update my Information’ (in the upper left-hand corner of the main menu), and click on the Fetch/Validate link next to the ORCID field. This will take you to the ORCID site and allow you to create a new iD or authenticate a pre-existing iD in Editorial Manager. Please see the following video for instructions on linking an ORCID iD to your Editorial Manager account: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xcclfuvtxQ

Re. Ok. We did it as requested.

7. Please include a separate caption for each figure in your manuscript.

Re. Thanks! We have added the caption for each figure in our manuscript.

8. Please ensure that you refer to Figure 7 in your text as, if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the figure.

Re. Thanks for your suggestion! We are so sorry to make this mistake. And we have corrected the figure number in our manuscript.

9. Please upload a new copy of Figure 5 as the detail is not clear. Please follow the link for more information:

https://blogs.plos.org/plos/2019/06/looking-good-tips-for-creating-your-plos-figures-graphics/

https://blogs.plos.org/plos/2019/06/looking-good-tips-for-creating-your-plos-figures-graphics/

Re. Thanks for your advice. We have adjusted figure 5 to make it more clearly.

10. We note that Figure 1 in your submission contain map images which may be copyrighted. All PLOS content is published under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which means that the manuscript, images, and Supporting Information files will be freely available online, and any third party is permitted to access, download, copy, distribute, and use these materials in any way, even commercially, with proper attribution. For these reasons, we cannot publish previously copyrighted maps or satellite images created using proprietary data, such as Google software (Google Maps, Street View, and Earth). For more information, see our copyright guidelines: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/licenses-and-copyright.

We require you to either (1) present written permission from the copyright holder to publish these figures specifically under the CC BY 4.0 license, or (2) remove the figures from your submission:

Re. Thanks for your reminder. We have removed the satellite images.

(1) You may seek permission from the original copyright holder of Figure 1 to publish the content specifically under the CC BY 4.0 license.

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Landsat: http://landsat.visibleearth.nasa.gov/

USGS EROS (Earth Resources Observatory and Science (EROS) Center) (public domain): http://eros.usgs.gov/#

Natural Earth (public domain): http://www.naturalearthdata.com/

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: LN 153-154: Soil physical properties were measured by the cutting ring method. Q#: What is cutting ring method? There is no references? Which parameters were analysed by Cutting ring method?

Re. Thanks for your questions. Sorry for the wrong expression about the method. The ring knife method is to use a ring knife with known mass and volume to cut the soil sample, weigh it and subtract the ring knife mass to obtain the mass of the soil. The volume of the ring knife is the volume of the soil, and then the density of the soil and other soil physical properties (field water capacity, capillary density) can be obtained.

Schematic diagram of the ring knife method

We have revised the Method part to make reader more clearly and we added the references to enhance the persuasion of our manuscript.

References:

Zhong FX, Xu XL, Li ZW, Zeng XM, Yi RZ, Luo W, Zhang YH, Xu CH. Relationships between lithology, topography, soil, and vegetation, and their implications for karst vegetation restoration. CATENA. 2022; 105831, 0341-8162. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2021.105831.

Blake GR, Hartge KH. Bulk density. In: Klute, A. (Ed.), Methods of Soil Analysis: Part 1, 2nd ed. America Society of Agronomy. 1986. Madison, pp. 363–375.

Gee GW, Bauder JW. Particle-size analysis. In: Klute, A. (Ed.), Methods of Soil Analysis. Part 1. Physical and Mineralogical Methods. American Society of Agronomy, 1986. Madison, pp. 383–411.

Again, sorry for the ambiguity expression in our manuscript.

LN 159-160: The HNO3-HCl-HClO4 atomic absorption spectrometry method was used to measure soil Ca and Mg. The contents of P, K, Na, Fe, Cu, Mn, Pb, Cd and Zn in soil were determined by ICP-AES.

Q#: Experimental methods – are extremely poor, cannot be accepted for any international journal.

Re. We are so sorry for the unclearly expression. We have revised the manuscript and added the references. We added the specific steps of the soil chemical properties experiment.

“Soil samples were decomposed by the HCL-HNO3 leaching method. Weigh 2.0g of air-dried soil sample in a triangular flask, then add 15 ml HCL (1 volume of HCL + 1 volume of distilled water) and 5 ml HNO3, add the plug and shake for 30 min, filter, fix the volume to 100ml, and waiting for measurement. A method to determine soil exchangeable potassium (K), calcium (Ca), sodium (Na), and magnesium (Mg) by using inductively coupled plasma (ICP-OES) (Plasma2000) and extraction with ammonium acetate was developed, which are measured by the Research Institute of Tropical Forestry, Chinese Academy of Forestry. The contents of P, Fe, Cu, Mn, Pb, Cd and Zn in soil were determined by ICP-AES”.

References:

Zhang YG, Xiao M, Dong YH, Jiang Y. Determination of soil exchangeable base cations by using atomic absorption spectrophotometer and extraction with ammonium acetate. Spectroscopy and Spectral Analysis. 2012. 32(8):2242-2245.

Lu RK. Soil agrochemical analysis methods [M]. Beijing: China Agricultural Science and Technology Press, 2000.

Recommendation: REJECT.

Reviewer #2: 1.The language should be revised carefully. For example, 1) in the introduction part, Line 62"the Grain to Green Program (GTGP)" and Line 98 "the Grain-for-Green project" should be unified.

Re. Thank you for your question. And we have revised the mistake.

2) and Line106, "three different types (CF, BD, EB) of forest vegetation (coniferous, evergreen broadleaved, broadleaved deciduous) "the abbreviations of CF, BD, EB are not corresponding with the order of the latter "coniferous, evergreen broadleaved, broadleaved deciduous".

Re. Thank you for your question. And we have revised the mistake.

3)And the abbreviations of Ks, SOC, SBD, et al., when they firstly show in the article, full name should be given.

Re. Thank you for your question. And we have revised the mistake.

4) and the first paragraph is not so relevant with the subject of the article, it is suggested to be concise and more focused.

Re. Thank you for your suggestions and we have revised the first paragraph to make the manuscript more focused.

2. The methods should be more detailed, for example, 12 vegetations were selected to investigated, but the data you use to analyze conclude data of three types, so in the article you should tell the reader how you deal with the data.

Re. Thank you for your advice. We have carefully modified the manuscript.

“In the present study, we divided 12 different tree species into three different forest vegetation types (CF, EB, BD). And we averaged the soil physical and chemical properties of three different forest vegetation types respectively for further data processing”.

3. About the chemical properties: Al, Ca, Cd, Cu, Fe, K, Mg, Mn, Na, P, Pb, and Zn, the relationship of the vegetation and these elements should be specified to explain the meaning of your study.

Re. Thanks for your question. We have added the chemical properties and vegetation relationship in our manuscript.

“Therefore, the study of differences in soil physicochemical properties, especially trace metal elements, among different vegetation restoration types is an important guideline for improving ecological restoration of natural and planted forests, especially in the subtropical karst region of southern China.”

4.The biomass study is not relevant to your subject, or the relationship of the biomass study with the soil properties is not clearly explained in your article.

Re. Thank you for your question. We removed the biomass part in our manuscript and focused on the difference in soil physical and chemical properties and the plant diversity during the vegetation restoration.

5.The conclusion "our results recommend planting the broadleaved deciduous species and coniferous species as the preferred tree species to enhance the soil fertility and water conservation functions", for your study is about the 12 vegetations dividedly, mixed forest is another story, your study can't support the conclusion.

Re. Sorry for the inappropriate expression. And we have revised the conclusion part.

So major revision is suggested.

Reviewer #3: Line 151-160 , Please supplement all references for soil physical and chemical properties determination methods.

Re. Thanks for your suggestion. And we added the all references about soil physical and chemical properties determination methods.

References:

Zhong FX, Xu XL, Li ZW, Zeng XM, Yi RZ, Luo W, Zhang YH, Xu CH. Relationships between lithology, topography, soil, and vegetation, and their implications for karst vegetation restoration. CATENA. 2022; 105831, 0341-8162. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2021.105831.

Blake GR, Hartge KH. Bulk density. In: Klute, A. (Ed.), Methods of Soil Analysis: Part 1, 2nd ed. America Society of Agronomy. 1986. Madison, pp. 363–375.

Gee GW, Bauder JW. Particle-size analysis. In: Klute, A. (Ed.), Methods of Soil Analysis. Part 1. Physical and Mineralogical Methods. American Society of Agronomy, 1986. Madison, pp. 383–411.

Zhang YG, Xiao M, Dong YH, Jiang Y. Determination of soil exchangeable base cations by using atomic absorption spectrophotometer and extraction with ammonium acetate. Spectroscopy and Spectral Analysis. 2012. 32(8):2242-2245.

Lu RK. Soil agrochemical analysis methods [M]. Beijing: China Agricultural Science and Technology Press, 2000.

Line 35-46,In the summary section, please add specific data for the related results. There are too many qualitative descriptions at this time.

Re. Sorry for the inappropriate expression. And we have revised the summary section.

Line 180-230，The results section has the problem of too many qualitative descriptions. Please add data about the results. For example，Line186，what is the highest value of the Liriodendron chinensis among 12 native species?

Re. Sorry for the inappropriate expression. We added the specific data of the Liriodendron chinensis.

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Prof Subodh Kumar Maiti

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

Responses to editor and reviewers

We highly appreciate the valuable comments and suggestions by reviewers on our manuscript. We made further modifications according to the suggestions of the reviewers and have attempted to address each point. The following are our details responses with reference to the order of the comments.

Part 1: Response to Comments by the editor.

PONE-D-22-29404R1

Variation of soil physicochemical properties of different vegetation restoration types on subtropical karst area in southern China

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Ninghua,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’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.

==============================

ACADEMIC EDITOR: In my opinion, the manuscript is much improved compared to the first draft. But as one reviewer pointed out, some problems still exist, the authors should respond to the comments and try to improve the quality of the manuscript.

Re. Thanks for your positive comments on our manuscript. The suggestions put forward by the reviewers are very helpful for the further optimization of our paper. We make point-to-point responses based on the comments of reviewers.

Part 1: Point-by-point response to Comments by the reviewer.

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

Re. Thanks for your comments

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #4: Yes

Re. Thanks for your comments

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #4: Yes

Re. Thanks for your comments

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #4: (No Response)

Re. Thanks for your comments

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

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

Re. Thanks for your comments

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #2:

1.The method that the authors dealt with the data is not right. "In the present study, we divided 12 different tree species into three different forest vegetation types (CF, EB, BD). And we averaged the soil physical and chemical properties of three different forest vegetation types respectively for further data processing”.

Re. Sorry for the wrong expression. We have revised this paragraph as “In this study, soil physical and chemical properties of 12 tree species were treated on average (groups of repetitions), and then 12 different tree species were divided into three different forest vegetation types (CF, EB, BD) for further data processing.” Hope the revised version could be more clear.

2.About the chemical properties: Al, Ca, Cd, Cu, Fe, K, Mg, Mn, Na, P, Pb, and Zn, the relationship of the vegetation and these elements is still not clear in the study.

Re. Sorry. We have added an analysis of the relationship between the vegetation and these elements, which is shown in the part “Effects of stand type characteristics on soil basic physical and chemical properties”.

3.There is still something wrong in the article, for example, "The soil chemical and physical properties and plant diversity of 10 vegetation types in Northwest Hunan were analysed."

Re. Sorry for the mistakes. We have rechecked the manuscript and made further modifications.

4.The conclusion is not sound because all the analyzing is based on the three group CF, EB, BD, but not "Liriodendron chinense (Hemsl.) Sarg".

Re. Thanks for your valuable comments. We have revised this part as “For these characteristics, the broadleaved deciduous forest may be the most suitable forest type in forest restoration management in the subtropical karst area of southern China.”

Reviewer #4: The manuscript is much improved compared to the first draft. The authors did well to add experimental and analytical details, improving the clarity of their writing. I think the manuscript is close to publication-ready.

Re. Thanks for your positive comments.

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