PONE-D-23-01627Soil Fertility Mapping of a Cultivated Area in Resunga Municipality, Gulmi, NepalPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Acharya,

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Surajit Mondal, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Additional Editor Comments:

The article described the spatial variability of different soil properties or nutrient in a municipality of Nepal.

1. The country is situated in the Himalayan belt and elevation of places changes greatly. Authors must clarify how sampling was done for sloping land and from what position.

2. Reference needed for the classification system of different parameters.

3. The result section needs to be grouped. Currently its looking very discrete.

4. A manuscript needs to checked thoroughly for typology errors.

Please find the attached manuscript for more corrections.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

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: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: Just few minor changes are suggested and the manuscript is recommended for minor revision. The manuscript is well written but has to follow the journals guideline. It is suggested that the authors make the correction and it can be published.

Reviewer #2: Title: The title of the article is accurate and directly relates to the purpose of the research.

The article investigates Soil Fertility Mapping of a Cultivated Area in Resunga Municipality, Gulmi, Nepal. It is an interesting approach and provide useful information for the readers. However, some improvements are necessary and more details is needed to add so as considered accepted in the PLOS ONE Journal.

The abstract should contain a clear statement of recommendations in such studies. I suggest to rewrite the abstract.

Introduction: Finally, specify the main purpose of the work and highlight the main hypotheses. In its present form, there is a double repetition of the same thread.

In the last paragraph of the introduction clearly state the novelty of the current study, according to the author knowledge and the missing/gap in the literature.

In the study area chapter add some details about the climate and particularly the annual precipitation and temperature pattern.

Materials and Methods: Refine the class boundaries.

figures 3, and 5 is not readable, legend much enlarge

Discussion: The discussion is very poor in the context of research in this area by other authors and the proportion in the structure of the work. There are two possible solutions in this case: 1) broadening with the use of the relations already indicated in the Results chapter, 2) Merging the chapters Results and Discussion with the approval of plos one editor.

Conclusions: The conclusions are constructive. Please just specify the summary of the results as in the abstract (see the manuscripts).

AbdelRahman M. A. E., Rehab H. H., Yossif T. M. H. (2021) Soil fertility assessment for optimal agricultural use using remote sensing and GIS technologies. Applied Geomatics. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12518-021-00376-1

AbdelRahman, M.A.E., Natarajan, A., C.A. Srinivasamurty & Hegde R. Estimating soil fertility status in physically degraded land using GIS and remote sensing techniques in Chamarajanagar district, Karnataka, India. Egypt. J. Remote Sensing Space Sci. (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrs.2015.12.002

AbdelRahman, M.A.E.; Metwaly, M.M.; Afifi, A.A.; D’Antonio, P.; Scopa, A. Assessment of Soil Fertility Status under Soil Degradation Rate Using Geomatics in West Nile Delta. Land 2022, 11, 1256. https://doi.org/10.3390/land11081256

Technical Notes

I suggest to create a scheme/figure that better explain the interconnections between the several sections/subsections and between the methodologies proposed and the several results.

The conclusions section must be improved with policy recommendations, practical implications and future research.

Recommends that the POLS ONE Editorial Board publish the article taking these minor changes into account.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Dr Pushpa Singh

Reviewer #2: Yes: Mohamed A. E. AbdelRahman

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: Revised PONE-D-23-01627.pdf

Attachment

Submitted filename: PONE-D-23-01627.pdf

Soil fertility mapping of a cultivated area in Resunga Municipality, Gulmi, Nepal

PONE-D-23-01627R1

Dear Dr. Acharya,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

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Kind regards,

Surajit Mondal, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

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: All comments have been addressed

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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: Yes

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

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

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: Yes

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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

**********

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: (No Response)

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7. 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 #2: Yes: Mohamed A. E. AbdelRahman

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