The complexity of predicting mortality in trees

This manuscript uses statistical and process-based models to study mortality of Fagus sylvatica at individual and population scale. The main results are that drought and late frost events were the major environmental causes of mortality at the population scale, whereas loss of hydraulic conductance and carbon starvation were the physiological stresses connected to mortality. In individual level, high mortality was related to low growth rate, high crown defoliation, infection by a fungi, high competition, high loss of hydraulic conductance, higher frequency of late frosts, and to early (statistical model) or late (process-based model) budburst. The topic is important and the approach is very promising. However, it is also challenging to report in a clear and structured manner due to its complexity. This still needs improvement before the manuscript is ready for publication. Also, there are several (small) technical mistakes and the language should be improved to be fluent. results of the population-level empirical how you can test the effect of early budburst in the population level model?