How to format your references using the Basic and Applied Ecology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Basic and Applied Ecology. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

Cazenave, A. (2006). Atmosphere. How fast are the ice sheets melting? Science (New York, N.Y.), 314(5803), 1250–1252.

A journal article with 2 authors

Hemphill, C. S., & Sampat, B. (2013). Intellectual property. Drug patents at the Supreme Court. Science (New York, N.Y.), 339(6126), 1386–1387.

A journal article with 3 authors

Perryman, S. A. M., Clark, S. J., & West, J. S. (2014). Splash dispersal of Phyllosticta citricarpa conidia from infected citrus fruit. Scientific Reports, 4, 6568.

A journal article with 8 or more authors

Polonia, A., Bonatti, E., Camerlenghi, A., Lucchi, R. G., Panieri, G., & Gasperini, L. (2013). Mediterranean megaturbidite triggered by the AD 365 Crete earthquake and tsunami. Scientific Reports, 3, 1285.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

Richter, D. H. (2017). Reading the Eighteenth-Century Novel. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

An edited book

Kardel, T., & Maquet, P. (Eds.). (2013). Nicolaus Steno: Biography and Original Papers of a 17th Century Scientist. Springer.

A chapter in an edited book

Dormann, C., & van de Ven, B. (2014). Timing in Methods for Studying Psychosocial Factors at Work. In M. F. Dollard, A. Shimazu, R. Bin Nordin, P. Brough, & M. R. Tuckey (Eds.), Psychosocial Factors at Work in the Asia Pacific (pp. 89–116). Springer Netherlands.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for Basic and Applied Ecology.

Blog post

Andrew, E. (2015, August 1). Watch Bill Nye Read Out Some Of The Hilarious Mean Tweets Sent To Him. IFLScience; IFLScience. https://www.iflscience.com/editors-blog/watch-bill-nye-read-out-some-hilarious-mean-tweets-sent-him/

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

Government Accountability Office. (1978). The Federal Information Processing Standards Program: Many Potential Benefits, Little Progress, and Many Problems (FGMSD-78-23). U.S. Government Printing Office.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

So, R. J. (2010). Coolie democracy: U.S.-China political and literary exchange, 1925-1955 [Doctoral dissertation]. Columbia University.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

Shpigel, B. (2016, September 30). Return of Jets’ Decker Is Clouded by Injury. New York Times, D6.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by name and year in parentheses:

This sentence cites one reference (Cazenave, 2006).
This sentence cites two references (Cazenave, 2006; Hemphill & Sampat, 2013).

Here are examples of in-text citations with multiple authors:

Two authors: (Hemphill & Sampat, 2013)
Three authors: (Perryman et al., 2014)
6 or more authors: (Polonia et al., 2013)

About the journal

Full journal title	Basic and Applied Ecology
Abbreviation	Basic Appl. Ecol.
ISSN (print)	1439-1791
Scope	Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

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