- Email: [email protected]
Peer review report 1 On “Modeling wind fields and fire propagation following bark beetle outbreaks in spatially-heterogeneous pinyon-juniper woodland fuel complexes”
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 201S (2015) 585
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/agrformet
Peer review report
Peer review report 1 On “Modeling wind fields and fire propagation following bark beetle outbreaks in spatially-heterogeneous pinyon-juniper woodland fuel complexes”
Original Submission Recommendation Minor Revision Comments to Author I found the paper to be generally well written and have very few issues with the information presented. Most of my issues are minor and due mostly to some terminology issues and how information is presented in a few figures. Specific Comments: 1. Page 4, line 72: “enable future decisions about fire risk” I would suggest that “inform” is more appropriate that “enable”. The decisions can be made without the information provided by this study, but those decisions will not be as informed as they could be. 2. Page 4, line 77: “changes in fine-fuel moisture...when needles die”. The term fine fuel moisture is typically reserved for dead fuels. Beetle damage causes the needles to transition from live fuels, which have a significantly higher fuel moisture content, to dead fuels. 3. Page 5 line 100: “ground fuels” is a term typically reserved for specific types of fuel such as duff. Litter and down dead woody debris is more correctly in the surface fuel category rather than ground fuel. (use of this term occurs several times throughout the manuscript - page 10, lines 209 and 214 as examples. 4. Page 20 line 405: Winds are the same for the live and dead cases, only the drop case is different. Any consideration for the fact that due to the transition from live fuel at 80% moisture content to dead fuel at 5-8% also causes a decrease in the canopy mass which would also alter the amount of wind energy absorbed by the canopy. 5. Page 25 line 503: It is unclear which figure this paragraph refers to, I assume Figure 3a since you mention actual heights rather than a scaled height but being explicit would be preferred.
6. Page 25 line 508: This paragraph appears to just be hanging here suggest keeping just the first sentence and combining with next paragraph 7. Page 26 line 520: Discussion of Figure 3c and d. dropped cases in 3c very similar why the difference in 3d. streamwise kinetic energy varies little between high/low wind dropped cases but the spanwise KE varies above the canopy, why? Also in 3d why the increase in KE at lowest level for live cases but a similar feature is not seen in 3c? 8. Page 27 line 540: These cross sections are taken at the top of the canopy (scaled height of 1 in fig 3b,c,d,e,f) not at 1 m 9. Page 27 Figure 4: need to annotate the axis so the reader knows which axis is x and y. I also think the color palette choice hides information as it blurs the transition from positive to negative values (its all green!). All we really get to see is the peaks. Suggest using a 2 color palette that transitions from say blue to red at zero. 10. Page 28 Figure 5: I got to this point and realized that the computational domain had not been described (extent/grid spacing), initial fireline length (I know it mentioned later but it should be presented before we see Figure 5.) 11. Page 29 line 593: “It should be noted that the ground fuel load increases in the DROPPED scenario for both the LIVE and DEAD cases” I am confused by this statement. First ground should be surface. As written the statement indicates there are live and dead cases for the dropped scenario, I thought there were 3 cases LIVE, DEAD and DROPPED. Should “for” be “over” or some other word? 12. Page 29 line 595: substitute surface for ground (not going to continue highlighting where this change should be made) 13. Figures 6 and 8: change in line types for cases is confusing 14. Page 43 line 828: what is meant by very light? can you give a fuel load for reference? 15. Page 48 line 955: did not find Colman reference in text 16. Page 50 line 1023: Linn et al., 2002 not found in text 17. Page 52 line 1081: Reisner et al., 200 not found Anonymous Available online 6 August 2015
DOI of original article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2012.11.007. 0168-1923/$ – see front matter http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2015.07.152
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Agricultural and Forest Meteorology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/agrformet
Peer review report
Peer review report 1 On “Modeling wind fields and fire propagation following bark beetle outbreaks in spatially-heterogeneous pinyon-juniper woodland fuel complexes”
Original Submission Recommendation Minor Revision Comments to Author I found the paper to be generally well written and have very few issues with the information presented. Most of my issues are minor and due mostly to some terminology issues and how information is presented in a few figures. Specific Comments: 1. Page 4, line 72: “enable future decisions about fire risk” I would suggest that “inform” is more appropriate that “enable”. The decisions can be made without the information provided by this study, but those decisions will not be as informed as they could be. 2. Page 4, line 77: “changes in fine-fuel moisture...when needles die”. The term fine fuel moisture is typically reserved for dead fuels. Beetle damage causes the needles to transition from live fuels, which have a significantly higher fuel moisture content, to dead fuels. 3. Page 5 line 100: “ground fuels” is a term typically reserved for specific types of fuel such as duff. Litter and down dead woody debris is more correctly in the surface fuel category rather than ground fuel. (use of this term occurs several times throughout the manuscript - page 10, lines 209 and 214 as examples. 4. Page 20 line 405: Winds are the same for the live and dead cases, only the drop case is different. Any consideration for the fact that due to the transition from live fuel at 80% moisture content to dead fuel at 5-8% also causes a decrease in the canopy mass which would also alter the amount of wind energy absorbed by the canopy. 5. Page 25 line 503: It is unclear which figure this paragraph refers to, I assume Figure 3a since you mention actual heights rather than a scaled height but being explicit would be preferred.
6. Page 25 line 508: This paragraph appears to just be hanging here suggest keeping just the first sentence and combining with next paragraph 7. Page 26 line 520: Discussion of Figure 3c and d. dropped cases in 3c very similar why the difference in 3d. streamwise kinetic energy varies little between high/low wind dropped cases but the spanwise KE varies above the canopy, why? Also in 3d why the increase in KE at lowest level for live cases but a similar feature is not seen in 3c? 8. Page 27 line 540: These cross sections are taken at the top of the canopy (scaled height of 1 in fig 3b,c,d,e,f) not at 1 m 9. Page 27 Figure 4: need to annotate the axis so the reader knows which axis is x and y. I also think the color palette choice hides information as it blurs the transition from positive to negative values (its all green!). All we really get to see is the peaks. Suggest using a 2 color palette that transitions from say blue to red at zero. 10. Page 28 Figure 5: I got to this point and realized that the computational domain had not been described (extent/grid spacing), initial fireline length (I know it mentioned later but it should be presented before we see Figure 5.) 11. Page 29 line 593: “It should be noted that the ground fuel load increases in the DROPPED scenario for both the LIVE and DEAD cases” I am confused by this statement. First ground should be surface. As written the statement indicates there are live and dead cases for the dropped scenario, I thought there were 3 cases LIVE, DEAD and DROPPED. Should “for” be “over” or some other word? 12. Page 29 line 595: substitute surface for ground (not going to continue highlighting where this change should be made) 13. Figures 6 and 8: change in line types for cases is confusing 14. Page 43 line 828: what is meant by very light? can you give a fuel load for reference? 15. Page 48 line 955: did not find Colman reference in text 16. Page 50 line 1023: Linn et al., 2002 not found in text 17. Page 52 line 1081: Reisner et al., 200 not found Anonymous Available online 6 August 2015
DOI of original article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2012.11.007. 0168-1923/$ – see front matter http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2015.07.152