How to format your references using the Journal of Ecology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for Journal of 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

Kittinger, J. N. J. (2014). A giant leap. Science (New York, N.Y.), 345(6192), 110.

A journal article with 2 authors

Rubin, J. D., & Taatjes, D. J. (2015). Molecular biology: Mediating transcription and RNA export. Nature, 526(7572), 199–200.

A journal article with 3 authors

Lee, J. B., Park, C., & Seoul National University Investigation Committee. (2006). Molecular genetics: verification that Snuppy is a clone. Nature, 440(7081), E2-3.

A journal article with 8 or more authors

Aoshima, N., Fujie, Y., Itoh, T., Tukey, R. H., & Fujiwara, R. (2014). Glucose induces intestinal human UDP-glucuronosyltransferase (UGT) 1A1 to prevent neonatal hyperbilirubinemia. Scientific Reports, 4, 6343.

Books and book chapters

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

An authored book

Liphard, K. G. (2014). Labormanagement. D-69451 Weinheim, Germany: Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH.

An edited book

Monvel, A. B. de, Buchholz, D., Iagolnitzer, D., & Moschella, U. (Eds.). (2007). Rigorous Quantum Field Theory: A Festschrift for Jacques Bros. Basel: Birkhäuser.

A chapter in an edited book

Gürses, A., Açıkyıldız, M., Güneş, K., & Gürses, M. S. (2016). Colorants in Health and Environmental Aspects. In M. Açıkyıldız, K. Güneş, & M. S. Gürses (Eds.), Dyes and Pigments (pp. 69–83). Cham: Springer International Publishing.

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 Journal of Ecology.

Blog post

Hale, T. (2016, September 22). Loneliness Could Be In Your DNA. Retrieved October 30, 2018, from IFLScience website: https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/loneliness-could-be-in-your-dna/

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. (2016). Intellectual Property: Patent Office Should Strengthen Search Capabilities and Better Monitor Examiners’ Work (No. GAO-16-479). Washington, DC: 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

Slabaugh, J. L. (2012). The Occurrence of Alternans and Arrhythmias in a Multicellular, Cardiac Preparation (Doctoral dissertation). Ohio State University, Columbus, OH.

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

Barron, J. (2017, July 23). Theater Evokes a Non-Disposable Experience, And It Starts With What’s Served at the Bar. New York Times, p. A15.

In-text citations

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

This sentence cites one reference (Kittinger, 2014).
This sentence cites two references (Kittinger, 2014; Rubin & Taatjes, 2015).

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

Two authors: (Rubin & Taatjes, 2015)
Three authors: (Lee, Park, & Seoul National University Investigation Committee, 2006)
6 or more authors: (Aoshima, Fujie, Itoh, Tukey, & Fujiwara, 2014)

About the journal

Full journal title	Journal of Ecology
Abbreviation	J. Ecol.
ISSN (print)	0022-0477
ISSN (online)	1365-2745
Scope	Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics Plant Science Ecology