Guidelines for Authors
Dear Colleagues!
Fund for Support and Development of Protected Areas "Bear Land" invites you to publish your research materials in a scientific journal “Nature Conservation Research". It aims for communicating results and novel ideas in research of biodiversity at Protected Areas, conservation of population of rare and endangered species of flora and fauna.
This international periodical journal has no page charges.
"Nature Conservation Research" is indexed in Web of Science Core Collection (database Emerging Sources Citation Index), Scopus, Russian Science Citation Index database, DOAJ, CrossRef, Index Copernicus, ResearchGate, and others.
"Nature Conservation Research" has an ISSN 2500-008X.
Publication frequency is 4 issues per year.
Starting since March 2021, we don't send hard copies of issues of the journal Nature Conservation Research to authors.
The main requirements for submitted manuscripts: a manuscript must 1) either be based on studies conducted (exclusively, 100% of data, or predominantly, no less than 70% of data) within Protected Area(s), or 2) be devoted (exclusively, 100% of data, or predominantly, no less than 70% of data) to rare and/or threatened species.
The main criteria for submitting manuscripts
1. A manuscript should not have an exclusively descriptive character, i.e. it should include analysis of data obtained and discussion of the obtained results.
2. A manuscript should be interesting for an international (not only national or local) readership, even if its immediate scope is local.
3. A manuscript should include a comparison of obtained authors' data with similar publications from other regions of the world (as widely as possible and needed).
4. We do not publish papers containing solely species lists for any area, although manuscripts using such data to address important questions of nature conservation may be considered.
5. The journal «Nature Conservation Research» doesn't consider publishing the additions to the flora/fauna of a certain Protected Area being a result of continuous monitoring of this area. ONLY final results of the long-term inventory of flora/fauna could be considered. It means that results of preliminary or too short-term (one field season or year) studies are avoided, preferring the publication of long-term research results. An exception may be results of particular value that are of interest to an international audience.
SCOPE
– Biodiversity and conservation of rare and threatened species.
– Inventory of living organisms in Protected Areas and other territories.
– Study and conservation of objects of non-living nature in Protected Areas.
– Long-term monitoring of environment components in Protected Areas.
– New concepts, methods and techniques for nature conservation.
– Anthropogenic transformation of natural ecosystems, invasive alien species in Protected Areas.
– Paleontological studies in Protected Areas.
– Ecosystems management for nature conservation.
– The legal basis for nature conservation and management.
– History and development prospects of reserve management and studies.
General information for authors of journal "Nature Conservation Research"
Journal considers manuscripts of following types and volumes:
1. Review Articles (up to 30 pages).
2. Research Articles (15–25 pages).
3. Short Communications (up to 7 pages).
4. Chronicle, Book Reviews (up to 5–7 pages).
5. Research Notes (up to 2.0–2.5 pages) [new records for fauna/flora of a country/continent, world, etc.].
The volume of manuscripts can be increased by agreement with the Editorial Board.
1. Journal “Nature Conservation Research" publishes papers written in Russian or English. But papers in English are preferred.
2. All materials must be submitted in electronic version. List of these includes:
a. file of manuscript prepared in Microsoft Word and named by first author name (example: ivanov.doc);
b. file with information about authors (see example below), containing the author(s) name, contact details (affiliation, position, email and postal addresses) and iD ORCID of each author; file must be named by the name of the first author with the prefix -attrib (example: Ivanov-attrib.doc):
EXAMPLE: Anatoliy A. Khapugin, PhD, Senior Researcher of the Joint Directorate of the Mordovia State Nature Reserve and National Park “Smolny" (430005, Russia, Republic of Mordovia, Saransk, Krasnaya Street, 30); Researcher of the Tyumen State University (625003, Russia, Tyumen, Volodarskogo Street, 6); iD ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6059-2779; e-mail: hapugin88@yandex.ru;
c.graphics files should be saved as one of the following formats: JPEG or TIFF. Each file must contain one picture and be named as follows: fig1.jpg, fig2.jpg, etc., which numbered in the order in which they appear in the manuscript).
3.The manuscript that is sent to the journal “Nature Conservation Research" should be carefully edited by authors.
4.Editorial board has the rights to decline the papers which have formatting errors or do not correspond to the journal thematics.
5.All files for submission of manuscript must be sent to the email address: ncr.journal@yandex.ru or additional hapugin88@yandex.ru.
Download Author Guidelines: RUS, ENG
General guidelines
Manuscripts should be submitted only in a file format WinWord.doc. At second step, the manuscript will be checked to suitability with the rules for authors of the journal “Nature Conservation Research". After this it will be sent to at least two appropriate reviewers. In a case of positive conclusion of reviewers, manuscript will be sent to the corresponding author with comments of the reviewer and editorial board for further revision. Then, author should present the corrected version of the manuscript and answers to the comments of reviewers within one month. If there is a delay with sending the corrected manuscript more than one month, the re-submission of the manuscript will be considered as a new submission.
Manuscript will be accepted for publication only after receiving the positive recommendations of all invited reviewers and agreeing the Editorial Board with their opinions. This reply must include final version of manuscript and a file with answers to the comments of reviewers. The article will be published after creation of PDF-proof and its approving by authors. After this step, any claims for formatting and content of the article will not be considered. Editorial Board will not liable for factual, spelling and stylistic errors in papers after acceptance of reply from author.
Manuscript must be compiled in the following order: manuscript title, full names of author(s), affiliation (the highest level, i.e. for example, name of an University, but not a faculty, branch, laboratory, etc.) with postal address, summary, key words, main text including all figures and tables (if any) embedded in the appropriate places, acknowledgements (if any), references.
Language
The text should be checked in advance by a native speaker or by a sworn translator. Otherwise, the manuscript will be rejected or returned for its improvement. Manuscripts should be only in British English (or UK English). Be consistent throughout the manuscript. Linguistic usage should be correct. Avoid the use of the passive voice.
Text
Manuscripts must include the following sections: Introduction, Material and Methods, Results, Discussion (a combined Results and Discussion section is appropriate in certain cases), Conclusions, Acknowledgements (if any), References.
Text of manuscript must be prepared in WinWord(use 12-point Times New Roman Cyr, indentation –
Manuscripts must contain only physical units and terms adopted in the International System of Units, the IUPAC nomenclature for chemical substances, geographical names consistent with modern geographical atlases. Values of a metric system should be preferably used (i.e. m, dm3 (the use of liters «l» is possible), m2 or km2). Authors should strictly follow the last edition of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature and the International Code of Nomenclature of algae, fungi and plants. A species mentioned in the text for the first time must be supplied with its author(s) (for plant taxa) or author(s) and the year of publication (for animal taxa).
All abbreviations (except for commonly used) must be deciphered at the first mentioning in the text.
Species and genus names of organisms must be marked in italics. Each first mentioning of a species name within the text must be provided with author(s)' name(s) (for plants) or with author(s)' name(s) and year (for animals).
To name organisms, Latin names must be used. Avoid using common names in any languages (they can be mentioned only as supplemental data). Exclusions could include widely used common names of middle and large mammals and some other certain widely known animals. Latin names of plant taxa should be standardized using database Plants of the World Online (http://www.plantsoftheworldonline.org/).
Geographic co-ordinates should be used in decimal form, i.e. you should present them as 46.591650° N, 49.178883° E, avoiding the following form: 46°35.499' N, 49°10.733' E.
References in the text are to be cited with author(-s) and year and be placed in parentheses in strict chronological order. Examples: Vargot, 2014 (or, “according to Vargot (2014)") – if this is publication of one author; Ruchin & Egorov, 2007 (or “as proposed by Ruchin & Egorov (2007)") – if this is publication of two authors; Egorov et al., 2015 (or “according to Egorov et al. (2015)") – if this is publication of three and more authors.
All electronic address (URL) must be prepared as hyperlinks to the active web pages.
Authors must different using of a dash «–» and hyphen «-»: Dash without spaces means the interval “from–to" in numeric and character values: example: 5–7 pages. Dash with spaces is used to denote dash in a text, period of the year, etc.: examples: ... where r – radius, m; ... in July – August.... Hyphen without spaces: red-violet color, single-flowered raceme, etc.
Spaces are needed in following cases: a) between number and the dimension (example: 3.0–3.2 mm); b) to describe hybrids (example: Mentha × piperita); c) between numbers and the multiplication sign or signs of «=», «<», «>», etc. (example: 50 × 76, p = 0.005, p < 0.0001).
Spaces must not be placed in the following cases: a) between number and sign “percent" между цифрами и знаком «процент» (example: 34%); b) between number and the dimension “degree Celsius" (example:
Manuscript begins from title. It is written in bold, 14-point capital letters. Full name(s) of author(s) must be written in bold, 12 points. If there are two and more authors, their full names must be separated by commas.
Affiliation of each author must be written. If authors are from different organizations, it is necessary to use superscripts indicating the relevant organizations (the highest level of them, without indicating of their branches, faculties, lower-level institutions, laboratories, departments, etc.). Affiliations must be written in italics, 11 points with indicating the relevant organizations and email addresses of authors. Affiliations must be left-aligned.
Title of paper, list of full names of authors must be separated by space lines and be center fitted.
Summary
Text of summary must be meaningful (to reflect the main content of the paper and results of study), informative (not contain common words), structured (follow the logic of description of the results in paper), self-sufficient (without references to the publications, with clear designations, no abbreviations). Summary must be from 250 to 600 words in 10 points. The summary should not be divided to paragraphs.
Briefly, the summary structure should be conditionally presented as follows. In summary, the background and relevance of the study should be highlighted in a few sentences. The following parts of the summary are: aim of the paper could be added; data on the used materials and methods should be listed; main results obtained during the study should be added; Finally, the main conclusion(s) should be added, which can be accompanied by recommendations, assessments, suggestions, hypotheses, described in paper.
Results must be presented extremely accurately and informatively. The main theoretical and experimental results, the actual data, interconnections and patterns must be presented. At the same time, preference should be given to new results and long-term significance, important discoveries, conclusions that refute existing theories as well as data which have practical importance in author's opinion.
Key words
From 5 to 10 words (in 10 points) must be written after summary in alphabetical order. Do not use the key words, which are presented in the title.
Article structure
Introduction. The section should provide an adequate background of the submitted research and indicate the main objectives of the conducted investigation. For this purpose, the section Introduction should include three conditional parts. First, the Introduction should highlight the international (and, additionally, national) relevance of topics related to the topic of the submitted paper in the light of modern literature. Secondly, it is necessary to show the research background (pre-history) of the submitted study in the past. Finally (preferably, in a separate paragraph), the purpose of the study and the research tasks should be indicated. We encourage the presenting of the research hypotheses.
Material and methods. Provide sufficient details to allow the work to be reproduced by an independent researcher. Methods that are already published should be summarized, and indicated by a reference. If quoting directly from a previously published method, use quotation marks and also cite the source. Any modifications to existing methods should also be described. The description of the study area should be included exactly in this section (sub-section Study area).
Results. The section contains all of the data to support (or refute) the hypothesis that was proposed in the introduction section. Results should be clear and concise.
Discussion. The Discussion should explain the significance of the results (but not repeat them) and place them into a broader context. For this purpose, the obtained data should be explained and discussed with the use of literature data of both international and national scale. A combined Results and Discussion section is often appropriate.
Conclusions. The main conclusions should be present in this short section Conclusions. The section should contain the main conclusions (without their numeration) based on the discussion of results, while it should not repeat data presented in sections of Results and Discussion.
The use of the names of Protected Areas and useful sources
If authors use names of
The name of each Russian Protected Area should be accompanied with the full spelling of its status, such as "State Nature Reserve", "National Park", "Sanctuary", etc. Examples: "Kaluzhskie Zaseki State Nature Reserve", "Chavash Varmane National Park", etc. For mentioning a Protected Area, it is not suitable to use only its status, e.g. "The research was conducted in the Reserve". It should be written as "The research was conducted in the Prisursky State Nature Reserve".
Before submitting of manuscript(s) to the «Nature Conservation Research» authors should check what was published earlier relative to their manuscript in order to avoid both plagiarism and incompleteness of data in manuscript. Authors may do it through following sources: CyberLeninka (http://cyberleninka.ru/), eLIBRARY (http://elibrary.ru/), CrossRef (http://search.crossref.org/) DOAJ (https://doaj.org/), ResearchGate (https://www.researchgate.net/directory/publications).
If manuscript is directly devoted to managing, protecting, enhancing or restoring of biodiversity or ecosystem services, authors should check the database Conservation Evidence (www.conservationevidence.com).
Figures and graphics
Graphical material (graphics, schemes, photography, pictures) must be embedded into text of manuscript after the first mention of them. Each Figure should represent a single illustration instead of the set of illustrations embedded into the main text. The total volume of graphical materials (figures, tables, etc.) should not exceed 35-40% of the total volume of the main text (from Introduction until Acknowledgements [i.e. excluding References]). Graphics should be separated from main text on top and bottom by line spaces. All figures must be numbered in the order in which they appear in the manuscript (e.g. Figure 1, Figure 2). In multi-part figures, each part should be labeled (e.g. Figure 1(a), Figure 1(b)). All figures must have appropriate legends. Each legend must end with a point.
Please provide the highest quality figure format possible. Please be sure that all imported scanned material is scanned at the appropriate resolution: 1200 dpi for line art, 600 dpi for grayscale and 300 dpi for color. In a case of color figures, Color illustrations should be prepared so that the information is not distorted in the black-and-white printing. Figures must be saved in separate files as one of the following formats: JPEG or TIFF.
If a Figure is complex (i.e. includes a set of illustrations (e.g. graphs, plots, photos)), each element (sub-figure) should be indicated by Latin letters (A, B, C, D etc.). They must be decrypted in the figure caption.
Figures must be center fitted; figure captions must be width fitted (without indentation).
For example (according to Fig.1 from https://dx.doi.org/10.24189/ncr.2021.022),
Fig. 1. Changes in the spectral indices NDVI and NBR after the fire on the reference sites; the years with maximum contrast between spectral index values for each fire class are marked in brown: a) high severity fire; b) moderate severity fire; c) low se- verity fire; d) unburned forests.
Numbers and indices
Manuscript must contain uniform writing of all formulas, symbols, hyphens, dashes, etc. Necessary Avoid mixed use of Russian and Latin indices. The indices should be explained in parenthesis or in context.
Dates should be provided with indicating of a century: «in 1990s» instead «in 90s»; and «during 1956–1959» instead «during 1956–59»).
Decimal fractions must contain a point, not a comma to separate fractions (
Use particular conventions if you are required to write digits:
a. Numbers 1–9999 do NOT use spaces or commas (e.g. 3333–no spaces for four digit numbers).
b. Numbers 10 000–999 999 have a single space between the hundreds and thousands (e.g. There were 287 701 participants in the survey.).
c. Numbers from 1 000 000 have a single space between millions and thousands, and between thousands and hundreds (e.g. The population of this Australian city was 2 467 789 on 03.12.2008.).
Formulas
Formulas in the manuscript should be prepared in Microsoft Equation or MathType Equation using 12-points style Math. All formulas and letter symbols should be prepared using the PC with a clear layout of all the features of the text (indices, bold text, etc.).
Tables
Numeric material should be presented in tables. Tables must be numbered in the order in which they appear in the manuscript (e.g. Figure 1, Figure 2). All columns and rows in tables should be separated by vertical and horizontal lines. Abbreviations (except commonly accepted) in the tables are not allowed.
Allowed to use a smaller font in text of tables (for example, 10 points). All tables must have appropriate legends. Each legend must end with a point. Tables must be center fitted, legends of tables must be width fitted (without indentation).
For example,
Table 7. Morphometric parameters for generative individuals of Dactylorhiza maculata (L.) Soó in coenopopulation studied in 2014 (ngen=12)
| Parameter | Height of individuals, cm. | Number of leaves | Length of leaves, cm | Width of leaves, cm | Number of flowers per one shoot |
| M | 47.8 | 6.4 | 13.9 | 2.5 | 28.8 |
| m | 10.0 | 2.0 | 3.9 | 0.9 | 8.5 |
| min | 22.0 | 4.0 | 11.0 | 1.0 | 11.0 |
| max | 74.0 | 8.0 | 21.0 | 3.5 | 40.0 |
| Note: M – mean value, m – error of the mean, min – minimal value, max – maximal value | |||||
Electronic Supplements
Electronic Supplements will not be embedded into the main text of the article in print. They will be available through the web-link on the individual web-page of the paper on the web-site of the journal of Nature Conservation Research.
All materials of Electronic Supplements should be submitted as Word-files (*doc). The general formatting of the text should be processed according to the guidelines for authors for the main text of manuscripts. If Electronic Supplements contain citations of references, the separate section of References should be placed at the end of the text of the Electronic Supplement (independently, whether they references are present in the main text of the article or not). Figures and tables embedded into the Electronic Supplement should be indicated as Fig. 1S, Fig. 2S, Table 1S, Table 2S, etc. Each of these figures and tables should be cited in the main text of the paper. The volume of Electronic Supplements is not limited.
Formatting of taxonomic manuscripts
Language: taxonomic manuscripts should be submitted only in English.
General guidelines. By submitting and discussing nomenclature issues, authors should strictly adhere to the rules of the last edition of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi and plants (http://www.iapt-taxon.org/nomen/main.php?page=title) and International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (http://www.iczn.org/iczn/index.jsp) and its amendment (http://iczn.org/content/electronic-publication-made-available-amendment-code). Locations should be associated with large geographical objects which are presented in small-scale maps. It is strongly recommended to list geographical coordinates as taken from GPS or online gazetteer, or georeferencer. Include latitude, longitude, elevation, habitat, microhabitat information of primary type material.
Type material: By submitting manuscripts with description of new taxa, authors should indicate where type material is deposited. Holotype should not be deposited in private collections. Include images of type material or representative species.
Zoological manuscripts: Authors of newly described taxa should indicate type genus (for taxa from tribe to superfamily), type species (for new genus-group names) and type material for species-group names. Authors should use the following order in description of new taxa: Genus (subgenus): Name, type species, diagnosis, comparison and notes, etymology. Species (subspecies): Name; Material (holotype and paratype, or syntypes, or hapantotypes) with indication, if possible and needed, number of type specimens (paratypes, syntypes), gender, ontogenetic stage, caste, sizes, preservation method or preparation type, place of deposition and inventory numbers (if any); Location (geographic data arranged in order from larger units to smaller ones), collection date, full name of collector, host name (e.g., fodder plant) and other data from a label; Description; Variability; Differential diagnosis; Comparison; Biology; Geographical distribution; Etymology. Names of a species and a genus should be written in italics. New names of taxa must comply with the rules of Latin grammar and be accompanied by the author's surname in the Latin transliteration adopted by this author.
Botanical manuscripts: The synonyms in nomenclatural citations should be listed in the following order: Accepted name, its synonyms, based on the same type (homotypic synonyms and nomenclatural synonyms), being placed in the same paragraph in chronological order of publications. The identity sign (≡) should be placed between homotypic synonyms. Synonyms of accepted name, based on other types (heterotypic, taxonomical) should be appeared each on a new line (paragraph) with its type on a separate line. Paragraphs should be arranged in chronological (oldest first) order, each paragraph should be started since equality sign (=). By citing the labels with incomplete geographical data, we recommend to indicate a country or major region in square brackets (e.g., [India], [Western Siberia]). Also, for renamed geographic objects we recommend to indicate (together with former names written in original labels) modern names of these objects. Latin names of taxa should be given according to the following databases: Plants of the World Online (http://www.plantsoftheworldonline.org/) for plants, Index Fungorum (http://www.indexfungorum.org/Names/Names.asp) for fungi, AlgaeBase (http://www.algaebase.org/) for algae. By describing new taxa of fungi, after the name of a taxon, the number assigned to it during the registration MycoBank (http://www.mycobank.org/) should be given. By using synonyms different from ones in mentioned databases, authors must provide references to relevant taxonomic publications. References to studied specimens should be concise, but at the same time they should contain full information needed to their identification in a collection (field and collection numbers, barcodes, etc.). Citations of herbarium labels should be given if the following order (regardless of the original spelling): Main text; Date; Full name(s) of collector(s), number (if any). Information, not indicated in a label, but identified according to indirect sources, should be given in square brackets. After citation of a label, authors should indicate (in brackets) Herbarium acronym (according to Index Herbariorum: http://sweetgum.nybg.org/science/ih/), collection number, barcode (if any). All specimens studied by personally author should be marked by the following sign «!».
Creation of dichotomous keys: In a typical dichotomous key, leads should be opposite to each other in meaning so that the species can be easily distinguished. Please do not format the key; provide it in the simple layout mentioned below. Leads should be numbered using Arabic numerals and sign «+» as it is shown in example below – each lead in separate paragraph without empty lines between them. The formatting of a key should be the same that for the whole text.
Keys must follow the example below.
Formatting and requirements to manuscripts submitted to the sections of «Chronicles» and «Book Reviews»
The submitted material should have an international significance. Before submission of the material devoted to a conference, subject of which coincide with the scope of the journal Nature Conservation Research, the author(s) should pay attention to the following: Editorial Office considers reports only about international conferences, which includes no less than 75% of participants, considered foreign in relation to the place of the conference holding.
In the section «Book Reviews», the Editorial Office can consider reviews of books, which have an international significance, which is not limited by interests by a separate country or region(s) within a certain country. In the submitted manuscript, the authors should reflect the significance of the reviewed book for various countries and various regions of the world.
References
All publications cited in the text should be given in unnumbered reference list following the text (with 1.25-cm indentation, font size: 12 points). References are ordered alphabetically.
Authors must provide DOIs for all references having those.
Authors must provide full titles for Journals (avoid restrictions).
References must include following information:
For journals
Smith J.N. Year. Publication name. Publication source Volume (Issue): Pages. DOI: (if any)
Example,
| References Kirillov A.A., Kirillova N.Yu. 2021. Helminth fauna of reptiles in the National Park «Smolny», Russia. Nature Conservation Research 6(3): 9–22. DOI: 10.24189/ncr.2021.034 [In Russian] |
Article in Proceeding Book or Book Chapter
Smith J.N. Year. Publication name. In: J.K. Lawrence (Ed.): Conference Book (or Proceedings). City: Publisher. Pages.
or
Smith J.N. Year. Chapter title. In: Book title. City: Publisher. Pages.
Example,
| References Ruchin A.B., Artaev O.N., Lukiyanov S.V. 2008. Ichtyofauna of some rivers of the |
Monograph (Book)
Smith J.N. Year. Book. City: Publisher. Pages.
Please, don't format books (monographs) under the book title on the section References. Please, list such a reference under name(s) of editors by adding «Ed.», as follows:
Smith J.N. (Ed.). Year. Book. City: Publisher. Pages.
Example,
| References Magurran A.E. 2004. Measuring Biological diversity. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. 256 p. |
Web-sources
Author(s). Year. Material name. In: Publisher website name. Available from: web-link (URL)
or
Source title. Year. Publisher website name. Available from: web-link (URL)
For example,
| References Gordeeva Z.I. 2009. Nature. Kirov region. Great Russian Encyclopedia. Available from https://bigenc.ru/geography/text/2067351 [In Russian] |