BLUMEA

JOURNAL OF PLANT TAXONOMY AND GEOGRAPHY

• Editorial to Vol. 46-1
• Change in instructions for authors
• Instructions for authors (PDF-document)

EDITORIAL to Vol. 46-1

Blumea has always been frugal in the use of editorials. Since the first issue of 1934 with no less than three ‘editorials’ in three different languages (Lam, 1934a, b; Van Slooten, 1934) only the end of World War II (Lam, 1945) and the Jubilee Volume in 1979 (Kalkman, 1979) earned this distinction. None of the changes in scope, editorial committee, cover, or layout have been honoured by an editorial. However, several changes, implemented or planned, in layout, editorial committee, publishing frequency, scope, etc. necessitate an editorial.

For the greater part the changes mentioned above are connected with the merging of the herbaria of Leiden (L), Utrecht (U), and Wageningen (WAG) into the Nationaal Herbarium Nederland (Baas, 2000). As a consequence it was decided that Blumea would open up its pages also for papers from staff members of Utrecht and Wageningen; this in turn means that the scope will be almost as wide as what it used to be in 1934. Geographical coverage will parallel the main research themes of the three branches of the Nationaal Herbarium Nederland: Tropical Asia and Europe for Leiden, South America (especially the Guianas) for Utrecht, and Africa (south of the Sahara) for Wageningen. The anticipated growth in number of papers will be accommodated in three issues per year, altogether covering about 600 pages. The editorial committee has been expanded with members from Utrecht and Wageningen.

Writing this editorial gives us the opportunity to thank all authors for the trust in and the patience shown to the editors past and present, and to thank all referees for their help in assessing manuscripts.

References

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Changes in instructions for authors

Changes in the layout have always been small and gradual. They were intended as modernisations of the layout. Blumea has always tried to offer clear and legible pages. This, of course, will not change. The most important change effective from volume 47 (2002) concerns the block of synonyms in the heading of taxon descriptions. In earlier volumes, we used the following format:

Millettia chrysamaryssa Adema

Citations like this will never be taken up by the Science Citation Index. To correct this and in the hope for higher impact statistics for taxonomic literature we have changed to the following format:

Millettia chrysamaryssa Adema

The sources cited are included in the REFERENCES as:

The Editorial Committee wishes to bring to your attention two things that they have been trying to implement for a long time. One of these has led to lengthy discussions with some authors. From now on we will be strict and keep closely to the rules given below. It concerns:

1. Sections on specimens studied. For years we have tried to reduce the number of specimens cited after species descriptions, often without success. This has slowly become more and more troublesome as specimen citations tend to increase in length by adding more complete locality descriptions, coordinates, etc. From volume 46 onwards the specimen citation is completely restricted to an Identification list in Blumea format (Collector + number followed by an indication (number or letters) of the species name). The only exceptions to this rule are type specimens and taxa described as new. Type specimens may be cited in the format accepted by Blumea, for the new taxa the (usually) few specimens may be cited. It is advised to keep locality description short and omit coordinates.
2. Person names with prefixes. To solve confusion in the use of prefixes in person names and to get a greater unity in the various lists (Identification list, References, etc.) we have decided to use the following format (as used for instance in Kew Bulletin):

   The first letter of the prefix should be capitalised; sorting in all lists should be on the first letter of the prefix.

   Examples

   In texts:

   ‘contrary to the views of Van Steenis …’

   In identification lists:

   Davids 201: 2; De Vogel 473: 4; …

   In references:

   De Wilde, W.J.J.O. 2000. …

   Van Balgooy, M.M.J. 1980. …

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Last modified juli 02, 2007 by P. Hovenkamp.