Dear authors,

I have read the very detailed comments from both reviewers, as well as the detailed responses you have provided to each of these comments. It strikes me that the points raised primarily require clarification, as they stem from confusion on the part of the reviewer.
You have made several clear comments on how you propose to update the manuscript to help clarify the points raised. Mostly your suggestions are clear. However, in several cases you leave it as reply to the comment. I would encourage you to consider adding one or two words/phrases to help clarify the confusion. This is useful for those readers who may be equally confused but are not inclined to go through all the interactive comments and replies (which I would suspect to be the majority).

On a couple of the suggested comments I would like to add the following;

Response to Reviewer #1
I think the comment on WR3A models is different should be addressed in the manuscript, as you are not clear if you will do this. It is I think important to point out that the structure of the model is important in being able to apply the approach presented, which precludes other perhaps simpler water balance type models.
On the flow diagram. This may indeed be useful, but as it primarily has the purpose to clarify, you may consider including it in the supplementary material.

Response to Reviewer #2
I agree that it is not necessarily beneficial to the readability of the manuscript if all the details on model formulations are included in the main manuscript. In fact this may even be detrimental. The suggestion to include these in the supplementary material is I think a good one, but I would also restrict that to not overburden these, as references are indeed given to more complete descriptions. I trust the authors can assess what additional information is useful here. The authors should of course clearly refer the reader to the supplementary material as appropriate in the main manuscript to ensure the link can be made where it is required. Perhaps that would also have helped this reviewer find the relevant detail.
It may be worth considering including the figure providing comparison against FLUXNET values in the supplementary material, in support of the comments in the main text. However, I would include in the main text a comment that you do not consider these as true validation I presume due to the issue of representation. This is commented on but maybe useful to add that additional sentence to clarify. Also, what is mean by N=16-168. Is this a typo?
On the discussion on “before reaching ocean”, and the need for better maps of closed basins. I would add to this that the reaching of the ocean is often also influence by evaporation (and the increase of evaporation due to irrigation). So while the DEM may indicate the river reaches the ocean, water in the river in fact does not. You could consider that not reaching the ocean is due to either being a closed basin or due to anthropogenic influences.

I would like to suggest the authors update the manuscript based on the comments and the suggestions they have made in response. In that update please clearly outline the changes.

Dear Authors,
Following the mutual advice of both reviewers, I would like to accept the revised manuscript and accept this for publication,

regards
Micha