Fairbanks Alaska, 18th April 2019

Dear Editors, Colleagues,

Thanks for the final version and submission with a detailed reply! I am happy to provide my review for ESSD-2018-113.
Overall, the authors did a nice and great job to reply and address concerns expressed by the two reviewers. It’s GOOD.
However, a few typos and small errors are found in the rebuttal letter, as well as in the MS text. Considering the importance of this MS, its data and coverage, this looks somewhat careless and so I kindly ask to correct the ones in the MS text (see below for a list).
Again, they are minor but they will make the MS and data much better.
Once done, we can move ahead into production and approve the MS for publication. I congratulate the authors and thank them for their work. This is a relevant MS and data set indeed.
Yours
Falk Huettmann, Associate Editor
University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF)

List of a few typos and English corrections in the MS text:
Abstract: LAI needs to be mentioned as a term first and then followed by the abbreviation. Please correct.
First phrase of the MS is very clumsy; please correct and use proper English; ideally two phrases.
Line 9: needs plural of ECV
Line 17: ‘on’ reads odd in that phrase, please correct.
Line 43: in situ should likely be in italics.
Page 5 line 15 and line 30: paragraph spacing looks odd, please check and make consistent as needed.
Throughout the MS text authors refer to LAI and always use both: the full term and the abbreviation. I suggest to introduce LAI once and then use the abbreviation only. It’s consistency what is needed here. Please check and correct; can likely be done easily with find-replace.
Page 7: Section 4.1 needs to be 5.1; please check and correct.
Page 7: Section 4.2 needs to be 5.2; please check and correct.
Conclusion: Reads like an abstract but not a conclusion. Please focus on the conclusion (what is concluded from this work ?!). I suggest to change a phrase or two to achieve it.

Acknowledgements: This is in the discretion of the authors, but I would always thank the reviewers (with name or without), it’s more transparent and considerate that way. Anyways, that’s up to the authors.
Figure 1: Legend needs to be consistent (Town should be in lower case then)
Figure 5: Both have exactly the same R2, yes ?
Finally, in my view, generalizing from a few sites to all of Mali etc should be done and stated very carefully – specifically when not modeled. So perhaps authors can add a phrase to that effect; just to make sure.

Dear Authors,
thanks again, I think this looks all very good now.
I suggest it should go in print, "as is"..
Very best
Falk Huettmann PhD, Professor
Uni of Alaska Fairbanks