Willdenowia - Instructions to authors

Instructions to authors

Original papers written in English from the entire fields of plant, algal and fungal taxonomy and systematics, also covering related fields such as floristics and plant geography, are eligible for publication in “Willdenowia”. Authors are encouraged to deposit vouchers of their material, in particular nomenclatural types, at the Berlin herbarium (B).

Papers submitted for publication must be accompanied by a written and signed statement confirming that (a) neither the manuscript nor parts of it have been published before or submitted for publication elsewhere, and (b) that it has been read and approved by all authors. Material, e.g., illustrations, already published elsewhere is not normally accepted for publication; exceptions are subject to prior agreement and to written permission from the copyright holder, to be procured by the author.

Manuscripts should be submitted electronically as a single rtf or doc file by e-mail; illustrations are initially accepted as low resolution image and should be embedded in that file. Manuscripts submitted must conform to the style and editorial standards of “Willdenowia”.

Papers offered for publication in “Willdenowia” are submitted to peer review by experts in the field. The author for correspondence receives the decision on acceptance or otherwise of a manuscript from the editor immediately after the conclusion of the review process. Authors may be asked to modify or rewrite their manuscripts to accommodate suggestions of the reviewers and editor and to submit a revised manuscript.

By submitting a paper for publication an author tacitly agrees to transfer full copyright to the Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin-Dahlem, such transfer to become effective upon written confirmation of acceptance of the manuscript for publication.

When preparing a manuscript, consult the last issues of “Willdenowia” and follow this format strictly. In particular, make sure to conform with the following standards.

The paper should be headed by a concise and informative Title and the full name(s) of the Author(s) and the address(es); if it has more than one author, identify the author for correspondence. An Abstract of up to 200 words and 5–7 Additional key words, supplementing (but not repeating) the title, precede the main text. The main text should be followed by Acknowledgements, References and captions for the figures and tables.

Scientific plant names used must be in accordance with the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature and are, irrespective of rank, consistently printed in italic type, as recommended by the Code. Personal names are not written in (small) capitals. Authors of scientific plant names below family rank are given at the first occurrence of such a name  and abbreviated in conformity with Brummitt R. K. & Powell C. E., Authors of plant names, 1992, and its updates at http://www.ipni.org/ipni/authorsearchpage.do and http://asaweb.huh.harvard.edu:8080/ databases/botanist_index.html, respectively.

Figures (Fig.), including drawings, photographs, graphs and maps, are numbered with a single run of Arabic numerals in each paper. The same applies to tables (Table).

Bibliographical references in the text are cited in the following form: Ehrendorfer & Guo (2006), or (Ehrendorfer & Guo 2006), or, if the page number is stated, Ehrendorfer & Guo (2006: 73); in case of more than two authors as Anderberg & al. (2002).

All published references (including such published online) quoted in the text, and only those quoted, are listed at the end of the manuscript under the heading “References”, in a format strictly analogous to that of the examples below. This applies also to references quoted in an abbreviated way in the synonymy of taxa; in papers with a multitude of such references this rule should apply preferably to contemporary and those references citing a certain minimum number of names, to avoid an inacceptable extention of the References section.

Titles of serials are abbreviated in conformity with Bridson G. D. R., Townsend S. T., Polen E. A.& Smith E. R.: BPH-2. Periodicals with botanical content. Constituting a second edition of Botanico-Periodicum-Huntianum 1–2. Pittsburgh, 2004 (online at http://huntbot.andrew.cmu.edu/HIBD/Departments/Databases.shtml). Titles of serials not listed are abbreviated according to the abbreviation standards there defined.

All titles are cited, according to the following examples, in the original language and, in case of non-Latin script, transliterated; additional translations, if appropriate, are enclosed in square brackets.

Engler A. 1911: Die Pflanzenwelt Afrikas. – In: Engler A. & Drude O. (ed.), Die Vegetation der Erde 9. – Leipzig: Engelmann.
Hackel E. 1882: Monographia Festucarum europaearum. – Kassel: Theodor Fischer.
Smith P. M. & Sales F. 1993: Bromus L. sect. Bromus: taxonomy and relationship of some species with small spikelets. – Edinburgh J. Bot. 50: 149–171.
Thiers B. 2008+ [continuously updated]: Index herbariorum: a global directory of public herbaria and associated staff. – New York Botanical Garden: published at http://sweetgum.nybg.org/ih/.
Webb D. A. & Camarasa J. M. 1972: Odontites Ludw. – Pp. 266–269 in: Tutin T. G., Heywood V. H., Burges N. A., Moore D. M., Valentine D. H., Walters S. M. & Webb D. A. (ed.), Flora europaea 3. – Cambridge: Cambridge University.

Keys for identification conform to the following example (other formats, e.g. indented keys, are not accepted):
1. Petal limb with a dark spot at the base; capsule membranous; basal leaves fleshy or succulent, subglabrous . . . . . . .  . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . .  . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . .  . . . . . . . . 1. S. sedoides
– Petal limb without a dark spot at the base; capsule relatively firm and opaque, rarely semimembranous; basal leaves fleshy, sparsely hairy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . 2
2. Capsule 6 mm long or more, oblong; cauline leaves obovate to ovate; anthers lilac; hyaline margin of calyx teeth smooth or shortly and sparsely hairy. . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . 6. S. integripetala
– Capsule 6 mm long or less, ovoid or oblong; cauline leaves spatulate to obovate; anthers white or pale lilac; hyaline margin of calyx teeth ciliate-fringed and often glandular. . . . . . . . . . . .  . . . . 3

Label data of herbarium specimens, when standardised rather than cited literally, are given in the following sequence (optional items in parentheses): Country, political subdivision or region, locality, (coordinates, altitude, habitat), date, collector(s) [and] collection number. They are followed by the standard herbarium abbreviation [according to Thiers B. 2008+ (continuously updated): Index herbariorum. – http://sweetgum.nybg.org/ih/] (and the herbarium accession number, if any), in parantheses.

After acceptance of the  manuscript, submit illustrations either in original, mounted on individual sheets, or as graphic files (preferably TIF format). Graphic files may be greyscale or colour illustrations (reproduced in colour only in the online edition) with a resolution higher than 300 dpi, or line illustrations with a resolution of 1200 dpi, in each case using a size at least equal to the printing size. Illustrations and tables including the space needed for the caption will, after reduction, have to fit into the type area (16.5 × 24 cm). Illustrations can be printed in colour if the author bears the extra cost. Indicate the scale by drawn-in scale bars and give the corresponding measurements in the caption.

The format of taxonomic synonymies is standardised; please consult recent issues, in particular for the arrangement of heterotypic (taxonomic) and homotypic (nomenclatural) synonyms and their types. Titles of monographs in bibliographic citations in taxonomic names are separated from the author by a comma and are abbreviated in conformity with Stafleu F. A. & Cowan R. S., Taxonomic literature, ed. 2, 1–8, 1976–88; & successors, suppl. 1–8, 1992–2008, but all components start with capital letters. Titles of monographs not listed in there follow the version used in IPNI (http://www.ipni.org/). Titles of serials are separated from the author citation by "in" and abbreviated in conformity with BPH-2 (see above).


A single set of proofs is sent once and, save upon contrary instructions, to the corresponding author. The authors are expected to correct them carefully and return them without delay.

The author for correspondence receives 50 reprints free of charge as well as a pdf file of the paper. With the pdf file the author(s) get the permission to make the article freely available by self-archiving, individually, institutionally or in a subject-based open access repository.

Download PDF version of the instructions (36 K)