Routine monitoring of western Lake Erie to track water quality changes associated with cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms

Boegehold, Anna G.; Burtner, Ashley M.; Camilleri, Andrew C.; Carter, Glenn; DenUyl, Paul; Fanslow, David; Fyffe Semenyuk, Deanna; Godwin, Casey M.; Gossiaux, Duane; Johengen, Thomas H.; Kelchner, Holly; Kitchens, Christine; Mason, Lacey A.; McCabe, Kelly; Palladino, Danna; Stuart, Dack; Vanderploeg, Henry; Errera, Reagan

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3853-2023

Articles | Volume 15, issue 8

https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3853-2023

© Author(s) 2023. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-3853-2023

© Author(s) 2023. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 15, issue 8

Data description paper

|

25 Aug 2023

Data description paper |

| 25 Aug 2023

Routine monitoring of western Lake Erie to track water quality changes associated with cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms

Anna G. Boegehold, Ashley M. Burtner, Andrew C. Camilleri, Glenn Carter, Paul DenUyl, David Fanslow, Deanna Fyffe Semenyuk, Casey M. Godwin, Duane Gossiaux, Thomas H. Johengen, Holly Kelchner, Christine Kitchens, Lacey A. Mason, Kelly McCabe, Danna Palladino, Dack Stuart, Henry Vanderploeg, and Reagan Errera

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Final revised paper (published on 25 Aug 2023)
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Preprint (discussion started on 29 Mar 2023)
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Interactive discussion

Status: closed

RC1:
'Comment on essd-2023-62', Anonymous Referee #1, 31 Mar 2023

This is essentially a data report on Western Lake Erie environmental/water quality conditions from 2012-2020. The paper is well written and organized and data (which are useful) have been made available via a website as well. Frankly, I don’t see the point in publishing this, as there are no interpretations and conclusions as to trends and changes in WQ conditions in W. Lake Erie, and any interpretation is left to the readers. Why not just convey the data availability via the NOAA-GLER website? The article should at least undertake some interpretation of the data, which can be done in a revision.

Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2023-62-RC1
- AC1:
  'Reply on RC1', Anna Boegehold, 06 Apr 2023
  
  This manuscript serves as reference material for those who would benefit from the use of this dataset and introduces it to a broader audience. The paper does not contain interpretations or conclusions on the data because that is outside of the aims and scope of this journal (https://www.earth-system-science-data.net/about/aims_and_scope.html). The aims and scope states “Articles in the data section may pertain to the planning, instrumentation, and execution of experiments or collection of data. Any interpretation of data is outside the scope of regular articles.” Interpretation of this dataset will continue to appear as standalone articles in appropriate journals, and we do take care to cite analytical papers that use a portion of this dataset in our manuscript so readers can see how others have interpreted this data.
  
  Through this publication in ESSD, we are establishing an official and permanently archived record that can be continuously updated as we add more data and update sampling parameters. Publication on the NOAA-GLERL website is insufficient as NOAA-GLERL is not an operational center so products on the website are considered experimental. This dataset is also permanently archived through National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), NOAA’s data repository; however, NCEI does not support detailed methods or background. Thus, we determined that publishing the history and methods of this sampling program in a peer-reviewed, data focused journal would be the best way to distribute and cite the details associated with this dataset. While this dataset is available to the public, this manuscript allows us to accurately track use of the data and ensure that the public is aware of methods used to collect the data. Tracking use of the dataset ensures we are providing useful data to the scientific community and the public, which is central to the mission of NOAA.
  
  Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2023-62-AC1
  - RC2: 'Reply on AC1', Anonymous Referee #1, 06 Apr 2023
    
    I understand the nature of this publication and the journal. I do agree that it is useful; information and hope that researchers and managers will utilize this synthesis in developing a long-term nutrient managment strategy for Lake Erie, that is baed on both N and P input constraints.
    
    Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2023-62-RC2
RC3:
'Comment on essd-2023-62', Anonymous Referee #2, 12 Apr 2023

My recommendation on this paper likely reflects that I don't think publication of a data report is appropriate for Earth System Science Data. If the journal does support a data report then my recommnedaiton may be different. It is not clear to me why the authors would not submit the paper to a dedicated data science journal or simply post the data on a web site, in a data repository and/or with a DOI to provide a permanent record. In view of the style of paper, there is a mismatch between the somewhat detailed information in the Introduction (similar to a regular paper) and the highly abbreviated (combined) Results and Discussion section, which provides highly abbreviated text that is adequate to support the data in figures and tables. There is little or not discussion of the data. Documentation of the methdology may be useful but again this is something that could be done through the mechanisms mentioned above, rather than through a submission to ESSD. There are a few minor issues in Table 2 which reports on the variables monitored and their units:
- would it be useful to include a n (number of samples) beside the parameter (should be variable) that is monitored, relating to surface, mid-coumn and benthic samples.
- Station depth in meters?
- Why are Imperial units being used: knots, ft, etc.? SI units surely?
- - Not clear what unit is used for cloud cover (octaves, percent or fraction cover?)
- CTD beam attenuation is presumable light extinction coefficient - similarly with CTD transmission
- PAR shoudl use units of umol not uE
- Microcystins shoudl clarify if this is total microcystins
- Ammonia is probably Ammonium-N. Similarly, Ntrate-N + nitrite-N and urean-N. This is a small but important distinction because the expression of concentration is as N (by atom) rather than the molecule.
- Colored dissolved organic material is not expressed as a concentration as the variable name would suggest. This is presumably DOC absorbance.

Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2023-62-RC3
- AC2: 'Reply on RC3', Anna Boegehold, 27 Apr 2023
  
  In response to your first comment, please see our reply to Referee Comment 1 above (AC1 posted on 06 April) as well as the "Aims and Scope" (https://www.earth-system-science-data.net/about/aims_and_scope.html) and "Manuscript Types" (https://www.earth-system-science-data.net/about/manuscript_types.html) sections of the ESSD website. We thank you for your technical comments pertaining to Table 2 and we will address these during revision.
  
  Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2023-62-AC2

Peer review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision | EF: Editorial file upload

AR by Anna Boegehold on behalf of the Authors (21 Jun 2023) Author's response Author's tracked changes Manuscript

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (27 Jun 2023) by Giuseppe M.R. Manzella

AR by Anna Boegehold on behalf of the Authors (06 Jul 2023) Author's response Author's tracked changes Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (08 Jul 2023) by Giuseppe M.R. Manzella

AR by Anna Boegehold on behalf of the Authors (18 Jul 2023) Author's response Manuscript

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Short summary

Western Lake Erie suffers from cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (HABs) despite decades of international management efforts. In response, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) and the Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research (CIGLR) created an annual sampling program to detect, monitor, assess, and predict HABs. Here we describe the data collected from this monitoring program from 2012 to 2021.