INTRO: The study seeks to explore the response of birds to forest structure, landscape configuration and climatic conditions, and whether this response is modulated by their ecological traits.
MERITS: I find very interesting the grouping of species by ecological traits to explore their responses to forest structure. Species showing the same type of response to a change in forest structure or composition could be conserved and managed together (more efficiently).
CRITIQUE: If the abstract is to be published in the proceedings of the conference it would be great to provide further detail on the methods used (although I understand it is a work in progress). For example, what was the indicator used to measure birds' response to forest structure (e.g. population growth/declines, habitat suitability)?; what type of forests were studied?; how many bird species were considered in the analyses?; what ecological traits were assessed?. Also, it would be great to know whether the authors have a hypothesis about what ecological traits could be key to explain whether the species is sensitive or not to changes in forest structure.
DISCUSSION: We still have little knowledge about how species traits determine species responses to changes in environmental conditions; a trait-based approach (as opposed to a species-based approach) could help making forest management more efficient to conserve a larger number of species on a single action. The results of this study could make a really valuable contribution in this regard (it is a very interesting topic).
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INTRO: This study explores the effects of forest management on the occurrence of birds in Central Europe.
MERITS: The study approach is interesting as it explores a wide range of factors affecting bird's occurrence and distribution such as forest structure, landscape configuration and climate.
CRITIQUE: The abstract will be improved if you explain and emphasize why is this study important in a general context. It will be good to include more details about the data and methods, for example, how many birds species and which traits are you studying. The study hypothesis ("We hypothesized that the species responses to forest structure is influenced by their ecological traits") will be clearer if you provide some examples. Are you expecting that specialists species will be more negatively affected by clear-cuts than generalist species? The results and discussion part are missing but I guess it is because you do not have them ready yet.
DISCUSSION: The results from this study have a good potential of providing relevant recommendations to forest owners on how to manage their forest to improve bird species conservation
