Dear Authors,

Many thanks for sending through your response to both reviewers, and for appending the revised version of the manuscript for viewing. In the first instance I only needed to see a detailed response to each of the points that the reviewers had made before revising the paper, but I can see you are already one step ahead. As you will be aware, the two reviews that were received highlight a number of aspects of the paper that required clarification and further explanation. Further, I originally provided you with a detailed set of changes to undertake prior to the paper going out for submission - some of the minor editorial parts were addressed, but many were not. Please could I ask you to carefully consider my original comments (and the more detailed requests I included) alongside the thorough feedback you have received via review.

As it stands, I am suggesting that you undertake major revisions of this paper, after which I will send it out for re-review before making a final decision on your manuscript.

Many thanks
Keely

Dear Authors,

Firstly, let me please apologise profusely for the delay in making the decision on this manuscript (my one excuse is the pain that is Covid, homeworking and homeschooling). Also there were a lot of edits and suggestions provided by both reviewers as part of the major corrections you were asked to address. I also wanted to work through the manuscript to add in additional comments and edits and to indicate where I fully endorse the comments from the reviewers and where changes must be made to your paper.

I would be grateful if you can - again, undertake the revisions that have been clearly articulated by both reviewers and also those that I have identified. Some of these comments are in the attached document (I used one of the reviewers copies to do this). I appreciate that following suggested edits in the PDF format is particularly challenging (I myself am not a fan) - but I encourage you to address all of the concerns - which mainly sit around the clarity of the text, not the scientific integrity of the work you have submitted.

There is still a large body of comments to be addressed, and I would ask that if you need, that you seek clarity from myself if you have any questions at all.

Best wishes
Keely

Dear Authors,

I have now gone through your paper. There are some technical corrections – these are really minor (see attached document).

There are around 150 comments in this document, but they are simply a case of deleting some extra words, a request to add sediment ages wherever you refer to a sediment depth, and minor edits on phrasing to aid the flow of the document a little.

Many thanks for your patience, and for undertaking a huge amount of work in response to multiple reviews – especially when doing so from an annotated PDF – that isn’t easy! Thank you for your continued efforts and persistence, and your willingness to deal with so many technical changes over the course of the last few months.

Best wishes
Keely