Dear Prof. Xu
Your manuscript has been reviewed by two ad-hoc reviewers. The comments appeared to be rather critical, and I am very pleased to see the efforts have been made to adequately address the major concerns raised during several rounds of interactive discussion.
Reviewer #1 indicated that the experimental design was not perfect, while reviewer #2 also raised similar concerns stating the data reported in this study, although not impeccable, can further our understanding about the influences of prescribed burning on soil greenhouse gas fluxes.
I side with both reviewers who provides constructive suggestions for data presentation and statistical analysis. The most important concern is about replicate for greenhouse gas measurement within each plot. In brief, I would like to repeatedly mention this point that the authors claimed four sites (plots) for gas measurement of each treatment, and reviewer #1 rightfully pointed to the flaw of experiment design, i.e., the measurement at each site or plot should have been done with four replicates. Under such circumstance the variability within each treatment might be reduced, while it will not fundamentally change the conclusion of this study because the four sites are truly biological replicates.
However, I do agree with reviewers that the authors need to clearly state the drawbacks and advantages of using such kind of experimental design. Please read the following papers and cite it in the manuscript where appropriate, before publication.
(1) Lennon, J.T. (2011) Replication, lies and lesser-known truths regarding experimental design in environmental microbiology. Environmental Microbiology 13: 1383-1386.
(2) Prosser, J.I. (2010) Replicate or lie. Environmental Microbiology 12: 1806-1810
Once again thanks for submitting your manuscript to BG.
Yours Sincerely
Zhongjun Jia