Dear Authors

I have considered the referees comments and am satisfied that the revisions you outline are satisfactory in addressing the referees comments.

I would encourage the authors to also revise the final statements in the abstract to better articulate the new findings presented and the wider implications of these results. Please incorporate the suggested revisions and upload a revised manuscript.

Best wishes
Jeanette Whitaker
Executive Editor

Dear Dr Allegrini
Thankyou for uploading the revised manuscript. There are are just two points remaining which need further attention.
1. In the editor comments I requested that you revise the final statements in the abstract to better articulate the new findings presented and the wider implications of these results. You have added a sentence which nicely summarises the results but you have not described the wider implications. For a wider audience a comment on the relevance of these findings to sustainable agriculture under future climate change would broaden the appeal of the paper. A comment on this in the conclusions would also be appropriate.


2. The second point is in the methods you have not included detail of the field site but have referenced another paper. Please include the location of the field site and the soil type here. Apologies I did not notice this on the earlier review.

Best wishes
Jeanette Whitaker
Executive Editor

Dear Dr Allegrini
I have considered the revised manuscript you have uploaded and am satisfied with the revisions made. I just note one technical correction which is needed. The formatting of table 4 needs to be the same as the others in having only horizontal lines.

Please upload the finalised manuscript to the system to enable the publication of your manuscript.

With best wishes
Jeanette Whitaker
Executive Editor acting as topical editor for this manuscript

Dear Authors,

First of all thank you for considering SOIL as an outlet for your work.
I am happy to accept your manuscript with just some minor things to change according to the suggestions of the Topical Editor.

best,
jo