Dear Maria Grigoratou,
Thank you for submitting your manuscript ““A trait-based modelling approach to planktonic foraminifera ecology” to Biogeosciences.
After considering the reviewers’ comments and your detailed answers, I believe your manuscript may be suitable for publication after major revisions.
Both the reviewers (and I) agreed that this is an interesting and relevant piece of work. However, some more effort is needed to clarify the structure and behavior of the model to appreciate better the results and conclusions.
The revision should take into account all the feedbacks provided in the referees’ assessment and it should include all the changes that you agreed in your answers to the reviews.
I look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.
Sincerely,
Stefano Ciavatta

Dear Maria Grigoratou,
Thank you for your revision. After considering the reviewers’ comments, I believe that your manuscript can be published after some minor corrections. Please address the few points raised by both the reviewers in a revised version that I will consider.
In particular it was noted that there is a mismatch in the definition of “Prey refuge” in equation A5 and in the caption of Figure A1 (i.e. a factor F): can you please double check the definition?
In addition, it was noted that eq. A5 of the revised version does not include the factor phy_PorZ that was included in eq. A5 of the original submission. Is this correct? I am wondering if there was an error in the first version of the manuscript, where there were both an (undefined) phi_PvZ in equation A3, and a phy_PorZ in eq. A5. phy_PorZ was defined both a “prey availability” factor (line 896) and a “switch” factor (line 905) of the original manuscript.
In the revised version, there’s only phy_P,Z in eq. A3, defined as a “switch” factor. I am wondering if the original manuscript was imprecise and the revised version is correct. Can you please clarify?
I look forward to receiving your revised version of the manuscript,
Kind regards
Stefano