Comment on “Fog precipitation and rainfall interception in the natural forests of Madeira Island (Portugal)”

Two different sources of error, consequence of unaccounted (gross) rainfall due to wind field distortion at the rim of a rain gauge, and more importantly, the use of a low number of rain gauges located below the canopy, are shown to have introduced high uncertainty in the large estimates of fog precipitation (several maxima peaks over 150 mm day−1, daily mean 30.13 mm day−1, and yearly cumulative values of about 4000–5000 mm year−1) reported by Prada et al. (2009) in a high altitude 1580 m asl tree heath forest. Their claims about fog precipitation representing a significant water input for undergroundwater recharge may be therefore doubtful.