Reply to a comment by R. J. Smalley and R. A. Antonia on ‘The local isotropy hypothesis and the turbulent kinetic energy dissipation rate in the atmospheric surface layer’ (October B, 2004, 130 , 2733–2752)

In response to Smalley and Antonia's comment, we agree that our statement that closer‐to‐zero velocity–velocity‐increment correlation for larger turbulence intensity values cannot be taken as a measure of homogeneity. We also explain that, although not aware that the velocity–velocity‐increment correlation cannot be zero at finite r 1 , we concentrated most of our analysis on its tendency towards zero with decreasing r 1 , since this limit is well known for homogeneous turbulence. Copyright © 2006 Royal Meteorological Society