| 12 Jan 2026
Phytoplankton community structure responses to episodic summer storms in a temperate coastal ecosystem
Abstract. Extreme events potentially modify the physical and biogeochemical environment resulting in dramatic changes of phytoplankton community structure. In this study the impact of 10 well identified storms on phytoplankton communities was explored in a productive coastal temperate ecosystem, the eastern English Channel (EEC). We focussed in summer because it is a low nutrient season where phytoplankton major shifts and blooms are not expected. Low-frequency (weekly to fortnightly) flow cytometry measurements of phytoplankton abundance were combined with high-frequency meteorological data (precipitation and wind) and hydrological records from 2012 to 2022. Storm impacts occurred in three distinct forms: high river inflow events, high wind stress–low inflow events, and low wind stress–low inflow events. High inflow storms, whether accompanied by weak or strong winds, promote coastal advection of riverine plumes enriched in nutrients, sustaining diatom dominance and, under high wind stress, favouring nano-sized phytoplankton (nanophytoplankton and cryptophytes). In contrast, low inflow conditions limit riverine nutrient supply, shifting reliance to regenerated nutrients from vertical mixing. When combined with strong winds, these conditions support nanophytoplankton growth, while short, low-wind storms favour pico-sized phytoplankton (Synechococcus spp. and picoeukaryotes). Across years, storms repeatedly reset seasonal succession and maintained environmental heterogeneity, leading to transient monospecific peaks of phytoplankton. These findings highlight storms as recurrent structuring forces in the EEC, mediating nutrient availability and driving shifts in phytoplankton composition across the summer months.
This manuscript provides a unique assessment of phytoplankton responses to different disturbances, here classified as storm events that induce changes in aerial, fluvial, and pluvial regimes, to directly identify the consequences of physical perturbations on the underlying biology of marine systems. Another positive point is the inclusion of different marine areas (coastal vs. open waters) and, in part, the chemical bases (nutrients). I personally find that the efforts reported in this work could be an elegant way to conceptualize the challenging dynamics of blooms. In this regard, I see the authors’ work as a potentially very interesting paper worthy of publication, but at this stage it still requires some polishing, given the number of typos and the need to better structure the methodology section.
Abstract
“We focussed in summer because it is a low nutrient season where phytoplankton major shifts and blooms are not expected.”
This sounds counterintuitive. Why would you study plankton shifts when they are not expected to happen?
“…phytoplankton abundance were combined with high-frequency meteorological data (precipitation and wind) and hydrological records from 2012 to 2022.”
Hydrological records include several parameters, and as I understand it, you consider only water levels? If that is so, adjust it accordingly.
“… nano-sized phytoplankton (nanophytoplankton and cryptophytes).” Why are cryptophytes not included in nanophytoplankton? And why do you make this distinction: nano-sized vs nanophytoplankton?
“High inflow storms, whether accompanied by weak or strong winds, promote coastal advection of riverine plumes enriched in nutrients, sustaining diatom dominance and, under high wind stress, favouring nano-sized phytoplankton (nanophytoplankton and cryptophytes). In contrast, low inflow conditions limit riverine nutrient supply, shifting reliance to regenerated nutrients from vertical mixing. When combined with strong winds, these conditions support nanophytoplankton growth,….” High-inflow-strong-wind has the same effect as low-inflow-strong-wind? Please clearly identify the differences and similarities among storms.
“These findings highlight storms as recurrent structuring forces in the EEC, mediating nutrient availability and driving shifts in phytoplankton composition across the summer months.” Could you say something about the use of your findings in, e.g., prediction models? Storm prognoses might be an important input to prediction models for phytoplankton.
Introduction – could be shortened
“The coastal marine ecosystems are vulnerable to changes in weather patterns and various extreme events, such as storms and heatwaves.” Extreme events are also changes in weather patterns. Please, modify your statement.
“At higher latitudes, storm forcing has been associated with enhanced primary productivity; for example, Pozdnyakov et al., (2014) observed appreciable Chl-a increase in oligotrophic Arctic waters within days of a cyclone, while Crawford et al., (2020) reported elevated net primary production in inflow regions such as the Barents and southern Chukchi Seas. Despite these insights, the responses of rapidly changing 35 temperate and high-latitude coastal seas to extreme events remain poorly resolved…” Why do you say that, if the research you cite is tackling polar regions and not temperate regions?
“The English Channel is a temperate coastal sea generally characterized by strong atmospheric frontal 40 activity and frequent extratropical storms, occasionally accompanied by thunderstorms. These systems typically originate in the North Atlantic and track towards north-western Europe…” This is a new paragraph, and it lacks the smooth transition to the study area. You could start with something like: Here we focus on the English Channel etc. State clearly which systems you refer to? Coastal seas? Modify the sentence to represent more clearly what you want to communicate.
“…eastern English Channel (EEC) is characterized by a nutrient-rich regime, particularly with an excess.“ Provide a reference demonstrating that. So far, you have only assumed that the nutrients are present and have used other parameters (e.g., a phytoplankton bloom) as indicators to support that claim. Cite the reference that claims this is a nutrient-rich area.
“The phytoplankton community was characterized using size-based functional groups derived from flow cytometry along a coastal–offshore gradient in the Strait of Dover, known as the DYPHYRAD (Dynamics of PHYtoplankton on RADiale) transect (Hubert et al., 2025b) by the Strait of Dover. The dataset comprises 1835 samples collected on 268 dates during a ten-year survey (2012–2022). Storm characterization was based on Météo-France meteorological data (wind and precipitation) from the Boulogne-Sur-Mer station (https://meteo.data.gouv.fr/) and river discharge records from Eaufrance (https://www.eaufrance.fr/) near the DYPHYRAD transect.” Reduce the text and move parts to M&M.
Materials and Methods
“… receives substantial nutrient inputs from multiple estuaries…“. You can claim that if you provide evidence for it, e.g., a citation, whereas a figure (map) you cite only shows that there are lots of rivers, but not what they carry.
“Chl-a concentrations were measured…” At which depth?
“2.3 Phytoplankton abundance” Sampling depth was not indicated.
“ Phytobs stations located …. Additional datasets from SOMLIT stations C and L were used to compare pico‑ and nano‑phytoplankton abundances with DYPHYRAD observations. These complementary observations were not included in the statistical analysis.” This part talks about microscopy? Where is the protocol for sampling, sample fixation, and analysis? You mentioned that you do not use this data (likely microscopy counts) for statistics, but what did you use it for? Maybe you have stated that, but it is not clearly written. Thus, adjust the text accordingly and add all the details: which net was deployed, at which depth, fixatives...
“Table 1. Sampling stations and associated spatial, temporal, and sampling characteristics.” For what did you sample? Just flow cytometry or microscopy, too?
Table 2. “Coccolithophores, and some autotrophs and armoured dinoflagellates”, what do you mean by some autotrophs? Then you also write: “Diatoms, and other microphytoplankton”, which other microphytoplankton are you referring to?
“Storm events in this study were identified as periods when wind speeds exceeded the 90th percentile (Fig. A1) (11.3 m s−1). Storm length was initially identified as the ±3‑day period surrounding the peak wind speed day, with day 3 designated as the storm day.” This should be the initial statement in this paragraph. First, introduce what storms are, then explain the rest. In addition, Fig. A1 shows the results and thus cannot be cited as such. Throughout the following methodology, you refer to numerous figures from the results, e.g., Figs. 3-7 and A1-C. These must be changed, and in addition, every figure/table should be cited in a numerical order; now, you cite Fig. 3 before Fig. 2.
“We expect phytoplankton to respond rapidly to changes in nutrient availability.” Why? Elaborate. The summer composition of phytoplankton inevitably includes many mixotrophs and heterotrophs that are already adapted to acquire nutrients in organic form. Why would you expect that such a community would have a rapid response to an inorganic surplus?
“In the study area, river plumes are transported under the influence of prevailing south–westerly winds.” Is there a reference supporting this claim?
“Consequently, the River Slack and the Wimereux estuary affect water chemistry along the transect earlier than other estuaries in the region (Fig. 1), thereby initiating changes in community structure.” Slack is located north of the transect. If you apply what you explain here: SW winds, it means that their direction will be NE. How can the River Slack then be important or affect the transect? Moreover, why do you say that the River Slack is affecting the chemistry and the Wimereux estuary? Does that include more rivers? Why not just Wimereux River?
“…number of windy days (wind speed > 8 m s−1) and average river inflow (m3 s−1)…” Unless this is stating the methods/protocols applied, the M&M should be devoid of any results. Please explain why these numbers were chosen.
“Phytoplankton abundances from the 200 pre-storm (−10 days) and post-storm (up to 14 days) periods were compared with this baseline…” Why this asymmetry? Why not 10 before and after?
Results
First of all, what I find distracting in this paragraph are the different ways of annotating dates. Consider unfirming them in the whole manuscript.
“Several storms persisted for multiple days (e.g., 2016‑07‑02; Fig. A1), with the 2016‑07‑02 event representing the most intense episode, during which wind stress frequently surpassed 0.1 N m−2 (Fig. 2). Storm associated wind stress varied considerably among events (Fig. 2).” How much did the most severe event differ from others? For clarity, it would be best to address when the figure or table is in the appendix.
Fig. 2 The dashed line should be called Mean or similar, and not numerically 0.1.
“Wind stress (τ; N m−2) across 10 storms, derived from wind speed over ±3 days around each storm. The red dashed 220 line marks the 0.1 N m−2 threshold used to categorize storms as high or low wind stress.” To categorize which part of the data? The mean, the medium? Later, you display low and high precipitation and inflow rates, clearly coloring them blue (low) and red (high). The consistency would make the figures more structured and make it clear that you are telling a single story rather than patching data from different sources.
…”“High” precipitation was defined as ≥ 16.12 mm, and “High” inflow as ≥ 0.45 m3 s−1 (Fig. B1).” Exact numbers are less important if they are properly cited than the fact that they refer to the 80th percentile.
“Other events also alleviated nutrient limitation, including the 2012‑07‑12 and 2015‑07‑13 storms (Table 3).” Refer to the concrete limitations, e.g., 2012-07-12 was a P-limitation. For 2015-07-13, I do not see a limitation. Please state which nutrient/s you are referring to.
Figure 3. “Precipitation classes (“High” and “Low”) were defined from June–July rainfall distribution, with the high threshold set at 16.12 mm (80th percentile); inflow classes were defined from June–July river‑flow distribution, with the high threshold set at 0.45 m3 s−1 (80th percentile).” Use the terminology consistently; here, you say rainfall, and on the figure, precipitation is written. The same goes for inflow/discharge in the text. If the threshold is 16.12 mm, why do you classify 2016-07-02 as high precipitation? In addition, it would be useful to display the threshold lines too.
Table 3. Use terms consistently, e.g., you use “after storm” interchangeably with “post-storm”. “Rainiest events were defined as those with total precipitation > 16.12 mm,…” By total, do you mean average or maximum? Why is it relevant how high the nutrients were after the storm if we do not have an idea whether they were higher or lower than before the storm? Revise and argument.
Figure 4. I find it a bit confusing to read these multi-coloured bars. Could you keep the same color for the same parameters and change the hue, e.g., blue for wind that is of a lighter hue for June, and a darker hue for July? This could improve the readability. In the same way, you can also color the axes/titles in blue for wind and another color of choice for the inflow. In the legend, the dashed line title should be changed, as it is unnecessary to repeat what is already stated in the figure description.
Figure 5. Why are the vertical dashed lines of different colors from each other? Please indicate that those dashed lines represent the day of the storm event. Adjust the title in the legend for the Chl-a mean as it is redundant, and those details are already stated in the caption. Are the whiskers standard deviations or errors? Are the points outside the boxes outliers?
Figure 6. Why climatological mean and not just mean? If it is climatological, both coastal and offshore would need that adjective too.
“Coccolithophorids peaked at 1.2 × 105 cells L−1 at the R0′ station (Fig. 7C(c)), while cryptophytes showed a strong increase (Fig. 7C(d)) at stations R1–R3 (mean: 3.6 × 105 cells L−1; max: 7.6 × 105 cells L−1), exceeding their climatological mean of 3.0 × 105 cells L−1 (Fig. 6).” I suggest commenting the results connected to spatial distribution too, e.g. what is closer to shore and what is in the open waters.
“Rather than stimulating diatoms, the storm amplified pico‑sized phytoplankton under the prevailing warm conditions, while diatoms were further suppressed (Fig. 7D).” Isn't this expected, as the smaller organisms will reproduce faster? So, why do you say rather than stimulating diatoms? Why did you expect that?
Discussion
“Summer storm impacts in the EEC were highly variable between years, arising from different combinations of river inflows and wind events that were in turn modulated by large-scale atmospheric circulation.” Cite papers showing that variability.
“These patterns directly support our initial hypothesis that different storm types exert distinct ecological impacts.” You did not hypothesize this; your hypothesis was that storms would induce disturbance in the phytoplankton community, but you did not hypothesize the heterogeneous responses to different storms.
“Specifically, our findings confirm that high inflow storms favoured diatoms, wind driven mixing, low inflow summers promoted nanophytoplankton, cryptophytes and pico-sized phytoplankton (Table 4).” What are you confirming? Something that was shown in other papers? Modify the statement and cite papers if needed.
Table 4. Rationalize the caption, keep the necessary information, and reduce the redundant information from the table. Elsewhere in the text, you specify P. globosa, so what is it: sp., spp., or globosa? Change the heading “Storm” to “Date”. All the storms under the header “Dominant physical mechanism” have a listed horizontal advection; it is redundant to repeat it. This can go into the caption. In the same way, under the header “Physical description” there is repetitive: “South-westerly wind driven coastal flow transports river plume northward” for every storm.
“Distinct and contrasting patterns emerged between coastal and offshore waters: diatoms were consistently more abundant in coastal zones (Fig. 6a), while Synechococcus dominated offshore waters (Fig. 6e). Seasonal dynamics revealed a June–July mean increase in diatom abundance in early July, following the spring bloom (Fig. 6a). Synechococcus rose in late May but dipped in early July despite warming temperatures, then recovered by late July as diatoms declined. This crossover suggests that transient meteorological disturbances, including storm related reductions in light or shifts in nutrient dynamics, temporarily favoured diatoms over Synechococcus. The subsequent reversal toward late July reflects a return to more stable summer conditions (Fig 6e). Similarly, high standard errors in diatom, pico‑sized phytoplankton, and cryptophyte abundances point to greater fluctuations during June–July (Fig. 6) due to storm driven disturbances.” Could you discuss this part in the context of what the literature says? Is that something others observe, that offshore is dominated by smaller cyanobacteria and close to shore, larger phytoplankton?
“Post‑storm peaks in microphytoplankton abundances were often driven by specific diatom taxa such as Leptocylindrus danicus and Chaetoceros socialis, whose abundances exceeded climatological records by more than 3‑fold. Leptocylindrus danicus dominated June diatom blooms between 2016 and 2020 (Houliez et al., 2023; Skouroliakou et al., 2022), except in 2018 when Pseudonitzschia prevailed, reaching ~106 cells L−1 and contributing 90% of total diatom abundance at SOMLIT C and PHYTOBS 1‑Boulogne stations (Fig. 1).” Cite the part demonstrating the 3-fold increase and the abundance of Pseudo-nitzschia.
“The recurrence of these post‑storm diatom blooms across multiple years (Table 4; 2012, 2013, 2016–2020) indicates that they are not isolated anomalies but rather a consistent feature of coastal phytoplankton dynamics.” OK, is there something like this described in the literature? What kind of post-storm blooms does the literature tell us about? Is the closeness to the shore something that determined a preference for a diatom bloom (e.g., silica availability aside from other nutrients, etc.)?
“By contrast, the 2022-06-06 storm produced a different outcome. With only a brief one‑hour windy period, the post‑storm community was dominated by pico‑sized phytoplankton (Table 4), with only marginal increases in nanophytoplankton (Fig. 7D).” How low can your resolution go? Wasn't it day-based? I find it hard to switch to the per h resolution, given that the whole manuscript was written using days, or even a 3-day level. Rephrase! Also, where are the h-to-h data? If they are not shown, please show them as such.
5 Concluding remarks
This reads as a continuation of the discussion rather than a conclusion. Rename and add to the discussion. If you think that the article is calling out for a concussion chapter, then keep it distilled to the key findings and remarks without a broad discussion.
Appendix
All descriptions above the figures can be rationalized and joined into the captions.
Figure A1 Cite it in the Result section. Why is the date on the x-axis in reverse order compared to the one inside the figure? ”Wind speed time series during storm events (±4 days). The red dashed line indicates the selected central storm day, with analyses conducted over a ±3‑day window around this reference point.” Why during storm events ±4 days, in a ±3‑day window? Explain.
Figure B1: Rationalize the caption and add the above description and cite it in the results section.
Figure D1. Shading or otherwise indicating the months used earlier for summer analysis would be useful? Which years were taken for this analysis? And please indicate locations rather than saying just “study site”.
Figure E1 Comments similar to Fig. 5.
Figures 6 Captions can be rationalized.
Table G1 Formatting can be edited, including the thickness of lines, merging cells, and indicating when p<.05
Tables H1&2 Edit table formatting, including the thickness of lines, merging cells, position of text in cells. Header “Date”, indicate the format y-m-d because you are interchangeably using different formats throughout your manuscript. Use station names consistently, preferably as they are indicated on the map. In continuation, is it Phaeocystis sp./spp./globosa? Revise: Chaetoceros socialis f. radians https://marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=163126 Status: uncertain > unassessed; Chaetoceros sp./spp.; Leptocylindrus (autres), you mean other, on which other are you referring to; Asterionellopsis sp./spp.; Chaetoceros (autres), do you mean other than mentioned earlier?
References
Add more and reduce the level of self-citation.
The manuscript is full of typos of different kinds.
Abstract
“focussed in”/ focused on, “well identified” / well-identified, “under high wind stress, favouring nano-sized phytoplankton” / under high wind stress, favour nano-sized phytoplankton
Introduction
Redundancy: “Existing studies in lakes and oligotrophic seas in tropical….” / Studies in lakes and oligotrophic seas in tropical.
“increase in the Chl-a (chlorophyll-a)” / increase in the chlorophyll-a (Chl-a)
“for example, Pozdnyakov et al., (2014)” / for example, Pozdnyakov et al. (2014)
“while Crawford et al., (2020)” / while Crawford et al. (2020)
“Over recent decades, the summer season in the EEC” / Over recent decades, summer seasons in the EEC
“…occurrence of the summer phytoplankton blooms and in particular to investigate the possible effect of summer storm events on the magnitude of the blooms and also the phytoplankton community. We were particularly interested to examine how…” / …occurrence of the summer phytoplankton blooms and to investigate the possible effect of summer storm events on the magnitude of the blooms and the phytoplankton community. We were particularly interested to examine how…
“…coastal–offshore gradient in the Strait of Dover, known as the DYPHYRAD (Dynamics of PHYtoplankton on RADiale) transect (Hubert et al., 2025b) by the Strait of Dover.” / …coastal–offshore gradient in the Strait of Dover, known as the DYPHYRAD (Dynamics of PHYtoplankton on RADiale) transect (Hubert et al., 2025b).
Obvious, redundant: “…events, assess the various impacts of storms on the marine environment and phytoplankton structure, and conclude with a synthesis of our findings.” / …events, assess the various impacts of storms on the marine environment and phytoplankton structure.
Materials and Methods
“Materials and Method Section” / Materials and Methods
“The The eastern English Channel” / The eastern English Channel
“…we incorporated datasets from two French National Observation Systems (Systèmes Nationaux d’Observation, SNO): SNO SOMLIT and SNO Phytobs.” / …we incorporated datasets from two French National Observation Systems (Systèmes Nationaux d’Observation, SNO): SOMLIT and Phytobs.
Using PSU is discouraged in oceanography and especially in scientific papers, e.g. https://www.coastalwiki.org/wiki/Salinity#:~:text=After%20receiving%20the%20latest%20issue,of%20the%20practical%20salinity%20scale
“…and salinity (S, PSU)…” / salinity (S)
Subsurface water samples were collected for dissolved inorganic nutrients (NO3-, NO2-, PO43- and Si(OH)4.” / Subsurface water samples were collected for dissolved inorganic nutrients, i.e. nitrate(NO3-), nitrite (NO2-), orthophosphate (PO43-), and orthosilicic acid (Si(OH)4).
“…Aminot and Kérouel, (2004).” / Aminot and Kérouel (2004).
“SOMLIT SNO measurements used in this study include temperature, salinity, nutrients (nitrate, nitrite, phosphate,and silicate),…” / SOMLIT SNO measurements used in this study include temperature, salinity, nutrients (NO3-,NO2-,PO43- and Si(OH)4),….
“…transect, chlorophyll‑a concentrations from…” / …transect, chl‑a concentrations from…
Unify the names of the stations and locations, is it: Wimereux SOMLIT‑C / SOMLIT C / SOMLIT Point C, Boulogne‑1 / Boulogne 1 / Point 1 Boulogne / Point 1-B, Boulogne-Sur-Mer/ Boulogne sur mer / Boulogne-sur-Mer…. ? Those also appear differently in Fig. 1, tables, and text.
“10mV…”/ 10 mV, “…5μL s-1…”/ 5 μL s-1, “…25mV…” / 25 mV
“time (8–10min).” / time (8–10 min).
“…(CytoBuoy b.v., Netherlands)…” / …(CytoBuoy b.v., the Netherlands)…
“… vocabulary of (Thyssen et al., 2022).” / …. vocabulary of Thyssen et al. (2022).
“Phytobs stations located south of the DYPHYRAD transect (50.8° N, Fig. 1)…” / Phytobs stations located south of the transect (Fig. 1)…
Table 1 Edit table formatting. Correct parts of the table. If all have the same time span for sampling, i.e., 2012-22, you can remove it from the table and add it to the table description. Also, the tables contour-lines are varying in thickness, which is something to adjust. You write “ Once/twice a week” with capital letters, but “fortnightly” with small letters. SOMLIT C appears twice, with different sample counts (168 SOMLIT C vs 160 Phytobs Wimereux (SOMLIT C). Explain why?
“90th…” / 90th Throughout the whole text, you miss the superscript for “th”, please correct it in the text, figure, and table captions, and in figures.
“Table 2. Flow cytometry (FCM) phytoplankton…” You have introduced this abbreviation but have never used it elsewhere; remove it if it is unnecessary.
The header in Table 2, “Phytoplankton description,” can be shortened to Phytoplankton.
“Larger cyanobacteria (e.g., large-size Crocosphaera, Richelia)” / Larger cyanobacteria (e.g., Crocosphaera, Richelia)
“…armoured dinoflagellates” / …armored dinoflagellates
“…(assumed here as constant ρair= 1.225 kg m−3)…” / …(assumed to be ρair = 1.225 kg m−3)… because the sign “=” implies a constant.
“…on the wind speed as (Wu, 1982):” / …on the wind speed as:, because Wu, 1982 was already cited in the same sentence.
“…(Eaufrance; https://www.eaufrance.fr).” and similar can be shortened by, for instance, hyperlinking the name Eaufrance.
“...(Derot et al., 2015), (Fig. 7).” / …(Derot et al., 2015).
“…(Derot et al; 2015).” / (Derot et al. 2015).
Results
“Storm associated wind stress…” / Storm-associated wind stress…
Redundant sentence, remove: “Figure 3 presents total precipitation and average flow rate during each storm event.”
Rephrase and remove PSU: “…produced marked salinity reductions (33.4–34.0 PSU; Table 3).”.
Introduce the abbreviation ahead: “ For example, the 2016‑06‑20 storm exhibited DIN and …”
Why do you start a new paragraph that starts with thus: “ …river flow below 0.35 m3 s−1 (Fig. 4).
Thus, storm impacts arose either from high inflows….”
Table 3. The “DIP” abbreviation was not introduced. Add horizontal lines or spacing between dates because it is very hard to follow the nutrient content in the current version. The column of nutrients can be split into two columns: the nutrient name in one, and the values in the other.
There is only one green in Fig. 5: “…(depicted in green shades, Fig. 5)…” / …(depicted in green, Fig. 5)…
“…six storms are presented in the appendix…” / …six storms are presented in the appendices…
Figure 7. “Exceedance probability (CCDF) distributions of six phytoplankton groups along the DYPHYRAD…” / Exceedance probability (CCDF) distributions of six phytoplankton groups (a-f) along the DYPHYRAD…
Discussion
“…wind driven mixing…” / wind-driven mixing
“In During June–July…” / During June–July…
“…Seine estuary…” / …Seine Estuary…
“…Somme estuary…” / …Somme Estuary…
Table 4.” South-westerly wind driven coastal flow transports river plume northward” / South-westerly wind-driven coastal flow transports river plume northwards
“High Inflow, Low wind” / High inflow, low wind
“…phytoplankton blooms can persist for weeks (e.g., (Rees et al., 2009; Skouroliakou et al., 2022) .” / …phytoplankton blooms can persist for weeks (e.g., Rees et al., 2009; Skouroliakou et al., 2022).
“…(number of days > 8 m s −1)…” / …(number of days > 8 m s−1)…
“…due to storm driven disturbances.” / …due to storm-driven disturbances.
“…when Pseudonitzschia prevailed…” / …when Pseudo-nitzschia prevailed…
Appendix
Keep the consistent annotation, e.g., is it Fig. C1b or C1 (b)?
Table H1&2 “Abundance (Cells L−1)” / Abundance (Cells L−1)
Data availability
Doi can be mentioned in the reference list if you mention the standard citation with the surname.