The manuscript has greatly improved in this new version in terms of readability and structure and the authors have in general correctly addressed most comments and suggestions. However, I think there are still many minor and technical issues that should be corrected.
Specific comments and technical corrections:
Abstract:
L2: Avoid repetition and improve a bit the narrative by better connecting both sentences.
L4-5: “this effect is” should be “these effects are”.
L5: Submesoscale processes coexist with different spatiotemporal scale oceanic processes always. Instead, I think the authors should somehow highlight that in coastal areas, oceanic processes act together with coastal ones, which makes it even a more complex scenario.
L6: What type of dynamic variables? Please specify. Also, delete “the” before “dynamic”.
L9: The link is always there but I think the goal is rather to understand/describe the link between.
L14: Replace by the whole name Deep Chlorophyll Maximum (DCM).
L15: Include the acronym and replace General with Generalized (do this replacement in other parts of the paper, for example in L80).
L16: Now DCM can be used instead.
L18: Use a more generic term than deviance: “variability of total…”. Also, include at the end of the abstract a sentence or 2 of main conclusions and/or implications of the study.
Introduction:
L21: replace “timescales” with just scales.
L22: I don’t know what the O before the parentheses mean. If this is a typo, please correct it. If not, maybe use a more general notation such as the symbol ~. Please, fix this for other cases.
L23: I think Interact (or interaction) is not the best word, in this and next cases throughout the introduction. Interact is a two-way direction, but these processes rather affect or influence the ecosystem (or in next cases the phytoplankton). Please fix this.
L24: Remove “the” before “photosynthetic”.
L25-26: Not sure what is the intention of the sentence. What does it mean that “extends beyond primary production?
L27-28: PP does not absorb CO2, but rather the absorption of CO2 occurs during PP.
L40: I don’t think “Contrarily” is the best connector here.
L43: Move “Latasa et al, 2017” after “drivers involved”. Also, (L56) “Caballero et al., 2016” after “plumes”.
L55: Add main or largest before “nearby rivers”.
L62: No need to define again what is the DCM; you can put just DCM.
L66: I think the authors should refer directly to the “submesoscale dynamics” (not just especially) and also that the other studies do not analyze hydrographic and hydrocynamic (erase the “s”) mechanisms at the same time.
L69: Replace “its” with “their”.
L75: Replace “the consolidation of” with “consolidate”.
L78: To avoid redundancy, replace by “…from remote sensing to in-situ measurements”.
L80: This last sentence is redundant. Just include in the previous one the new information that is missing (i.e. “on phytoplankton distribution above and below the pycnocline, and at the DCM”), and erase this one.
Material and Methods:
L88: “Undercover” should be uncover, unveil, unravel…
L96: Replace by light-emitting diodes (LEDs).
L98: What do you mean with mixed red group? Cyanobacteria are already in the Blue algae group, which I think is correct. Do some cyanobacteria belong to this group? Please specify this. Also, if the “it” in “it estimates” refers to the FluoroProbe, please replace with this.
Replacements: (L109) by long-range high-frequency (HF) radar. (L130) by Muller et al. (2009). (L133) by Sea Surface Temperature (SST). (L146) by Gomis et al. (2001).
L168: Replace by "sections of the water column" or by "layers of the water column".
L169-171: Suggestion to improve and simplify the sentence: Therefore, the dataset was divided in three different dynamic sections/layers “Above the pycnocline”, “Below the pycnocline” and “at the DCM”.
L173: Erase this sentence as this was already said in the last sentence of the previous section.
L180: An error term should be added at the end of the formula (+ epsilon).
L189: Replace “approached” by “approach”
L190: Is this Wood 2006? Wood 2000? You have this reference incomplete in the bibliography.
L192: Replace by (Llope et al. 2009).
L196: Please keep the same precision for the values (choose 3 or 4 decimal digits).
Results:
L206: Please replace “Then” by Thus or Therefore if this is a conclusion from the previous lines. Also, the Etoile cruise occurred 2-4 August 2017, and according to Fig. 2, the direction of the wind was more or less constant during these dates.
L207: Replace by "fields; the latter allowed us" or similar.
Replacements: (L209) “give” by gave. (L210) “provide” by provided or provides.
L216: insert a comma after 2nd. “sharp change” can be replaced by “sharp decrease” to reinforce the message. In L222, insert the 2nd parenthesis after Figure 4.
L224: “35.5” is the minimum value so replace < by ~. Or choose a different threshold (<35.56 or <35.57). Apply this idea to the next threshold mentioned (>35.6).
L228: This was already mentioned and can be deleted.
L255: Why salinity provides a synoptic distribution of phytoplankton? Move this information at the end of next sentence and link it with the existence of a plume. Also, delete the “the” before “the phytoplankton”.
Section 3.3 is a bit difficult to follow as there is too much information and details. I think it should be simplified, highlighting mainly the relationships and details that are most relevant to the story and main messages of the paper (see for instance the last part of the first paragraph in the discussion and section 4.2).
Another issue in this Section 3.3 that was already mentioned in the previous review is that the description of the shape of the relationships is in general confusing and should be better written and explained. Some examples (but check all of them): (L278) lower salinity values can be associated with higher chl a, i.e. they show a negative correlation/relationship; (L284-285): Chl a of brown shows a dome-shape relationship with salinity, with a maximum at around 35.1, so below the effect of increasing salinity is positive and below is negative; (L285) If the relationship is in general negative, the effect of temperature is negative; (L302) Again a case of dome-shape relationship. (L304) Check this one too.
L280: Something is missing in “to the explain the”.
L287: Percentage symbol should be after the value in %23.3. Fix this for the other cases.
L300: Include reference to table 1 and maybe figure 9 after “the deviance”. Also, in L319, after “the deviance” but in this case Table 1 and maybe figure 10.
Discussion:
L390-394 belong to results (and even the part of the statistical analysis to M&M). Also, L421-428.
L391: Delete the “And” before “in addition”. Also delete “the” in L401 after “explained by” and in L402 after “deviance is”.
L415: I think this could be better written, something similar to "The negative effect of salinity for values higher than 35.1 (figure 8e) is still present below the pycnocline".
L441: Modify as (D'Ovidio et al., 2010).
L460: Replace “Will help” by something like “would have helped”.
L471: Should it be “direction and speed”?
Figures:
General comment also mentioned in the previous review: include in the caption all the information necessary to understand each figure, including explanation for acronyms (the same goes for tables).
Fig1: Delete “these are” in “these are located every”. Also replace “dots represents” by “dots represent” and delete the “to” in “to the HF radar”. Replace “data, while big white dots to the” by something similar to “data, and big/large with dots mark the”. Additionally, replace “square” by “rectangle” and “zoom in area” by “area zoomed in A”.
Fig3: Include in the caption a mention of the Cyclonic eddies drawn in the left column (also in Fig. 4). Replace “to periods” by “two periods”.
Fig4: Also mentioned in the previous review: Include a note at the end of the caption that the scale range for each variable is different for each depth. This is important as the reader might try to compare the three depths.
Fig5: As this cross section goes through A17 and C17E, I think it would nice to draw them as horizontal lines above each column, with its corresponding color and include reference in the caption (also this could be done in Fig. 7). Include also the period (2nd-4th August 2017). Please do also this in Figs. 6 and 7. At the end of the 1s line in the caption, replace by "salinity (A) and temperature (B) with isopycnals (black and white contours, respectively)". Indicate after velocities that solid or dashed black contours correspond to positive or negative velocities.
Fig6: If possible, draw also the eddies. Replace “the black” by “and black ones”.
Fig7: after 43.11ºN, include reference to Figs 1,4 and 5 (as in Fig. 5).
Tables:
Table1: Is Standard Deviation or Standard Error? you wrote SE. Replace “GAMs for” by “GAMs for the water column sections/layers”. Replace “the Deep Chlorophyll” by “at the Deep Chlorophyll”. Also indicate that dependent variables are the estimated Chl a concentrations for different algae groups and also define what is B:G (also in Table 2). The p-value is missing for DCM, total Chl a. Also, the precision has to be always the same. For instance, if in a case the deviance explained is 57.10, then it has to be in other case 43.00 and not 43 (always 2 decimal digits). Check also this in Table 2. Additionally, deviance explained and R2 report similar information so pick one of them. Why Intercept, SE and deviance explained is separated from the covariate results and R2? If there is no clear reason, merge both groups of rows as this could be confusing.
Table2: Maybe better replace “Deviance contribution” by “Variance contribution” as in Llope et al. 2009. The R2 is the percentage of variance explained, in this case by the model. However, you also report a percentage of variance accounted by the model. In the table, both seem to correspond to different things, in particular R2 correspond to the whole model and the % is related to each environmental variable. Please clarify this in the caption for Stepwise Deletion and Delete-one-covariance. Also, indicate in the caption the meaning of the values in bold. Include all the information in the caption, about the water column sections and dependent variables. Finally, replace "vorticity and salinity" by "vorticity or salinity" as the models include only 1 variable. |
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