Guide for Authors
Editorial Policy
Forest Science seeks manuscripts that either report significant research in subjects related to forestry broadly defined, or report investigations into management and practice in any of the forested ecosystems of the world. Manuscripts submitted to Forest Science must not have been previously published and must not be under consideration for publication elsewhere. All manuscripts submitted to Forest Science undergo peer review.
The Society of American Foresters holds copyright to Forest Science, and authors will be asked to assign their rights before their contributions are published. A form will be provided for this purpose. Authors whose work is not subject to copyright (e.g., United States federal government employees), should so state when they submit their manuscripts.
Editorial correspondence should be addressed to Scott Roberts(robertss@safnet.org), Editor-in-Chief, Forest Science. Direct all correspondence pertaining to manuscript submission and status to Morgan Fincham (journal@safnet.org), Senior Managing Editor, Forest Science, 2121 K St. NW, Suite 315, Washington, D.C. 20037; (866) 897-8720.
Authorship Policy
Forest Science credits authorship to those who have made a substantial contribution to the submitted manuscript. Authorship constitutes the following roles in manuscript development:
The individual has participated sufficiently in the research, design, or analysis of the study
The individual has participated in the drafting, critical review, and evaluation of the manuscript.
The individual agrees to be accountable for their work following publication.
All others may be listed in the acknowledgments section of the manuscript. Additional details about SAF’s authorship policy.
Conflicts of interest
Each author should reveal any financial interests or connections, direct or indirect, or other situations that might raise the question of bias in the work reported or the conclusions, implications, or opinions stated – including pertinent commercial or other sources of funding for the individual author(s) or for the associated department(s) or organization(s), personal relationships, or direct academic competition.
Open Access
SAF is committed to advancing the science, education, technology, and practice of forestry. In support of this mission, SAF journals allow authors to post the accepted, pre-print version of their manuscript on the author's personal website or deposit the article into any institutional repository maintained by the author's employer after a 12-month embargo. This is often referred to as "Green Open Access".
We ask that authors link to the published version via the article DOI.
For a complete list of all rights retained by authors published within the Forest Science, see Rights & Permissions.
Forest Science offers the option of publishing under either a standard licence or an open access licence. Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution.
Should you wish to publish your article open access, you should select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence.
Details of the open access licences and open access charges.
OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia which provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution is participating.
Please note that you may be eligible for a discount to the open access charge based on society membership. Authors may be asked to prove eligibility for the member discount.
Authors who do not select a Creative Commons license will have their articles published with standard subscription-based access and will not be charged.
Submission Guidelines
All scientific articles are evaluated through a double-blind peer review. All articles must be uploaded through SAF’s online submissions platform, Editorial Manager. The journal follows the Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition.
Scientific and Scholarly Articles
All scientific or scholarly manuscripts must include an Abstract of no more than 200 words and a Study Implications of no more than 100 words.
Study implications: Research articles and brief communications submitted to Forest Science must include a study implications section that provides a clear and concise interpretation to help a layperson understand the article. Maximum of 100 words.
Because the review process is double-blind, please ensure that authors are not identified anywhere in the manuscript (including headers and footers).
Original Research Articles (excluding tables, figures, and literature cited)
Word Limits
Main document 7,000 maximum
Abstract 200 maximum
Study Implications 100 maximum
Title 15 maximum
Format
Units in metric*
Main document is double spaced
Lines numbered continuously
Endnotes are permissible
*With permission of the Editor, English units may be substituted for metric.
Review Articles
Review Articles provide syntheses of the current knowledge in broad topical areas of current importance. Review Articles should consider diverging paths of thought within a topic without necessarily pronouncing judgment.
Word Limits
10,000 maximum (excluding tables, figures, and literature cited)
Brief Communications
Preliminary or novel results on limited scientific data sets or applications of existing methodologies to new research areas.
Word limits
1,700 maximum (excluding literature cited)
Style and Form
Language and Grammar
Non-native English speaking authors are strongly encouraged to obtain an English-language review of their manuscript PRIOR to submission. English units are preferred.
Nomenclature and Terminology
Common names are used for most plants and animals. Scientific names are included in parentheses following the first use of the common name. The Checklist of United States Trees (Native and Naturalized) by E.L. Little Jr. (Agriculture Handbook 541, USDA 1979) and the appendixes of Forest Cover Types of the United States and Canada (SAF 1980) are useful references for plant names. Technical usage in forestry and allied fields follows The Dictionary of Forestry (SAF 2018).
Mathematical Material
See Scientific Style and Formats: The CBE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers (Cambridge University Press) for methods of presenting mathematical material in the simplest form to ensure accuracy and prompt publication of paper.
Literature Cited
References appearing in the text need to appear in the citation list at the end of the article per Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition.
List all references alphabetically at the end of the paper and cite them parenthetically in the text by the author-date system per Chicago Manual of Style, e.g., (Smith 2006).
Examples of Literature Cited style:
Book
Houghton, J.T., G.J. Jenkins, and J.J. Ephraums. 1990. Climate change: The IPCC scientific assessment. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom. 365 p.
Chapter in book
Brokaw, N.V.L. 1982. Treefalls: Frequency timing and consequences. P. 101-108 in The ecology of a tropical forest: Seasonal rhythms and long term changes, Egbert Giles Leigh Jr., A.S. Rand, and D.M. Windsor (eds.). Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Article in journal
Jurgensen, M.F., J. Johnson, M.A. Wise, C.S. Williams, and R. Wilson. 1997. Impacts of timber harvesting on soil organic matter, nitrogen, productivity, and health of Inland Northwest forests. For. Sci. 43(2):234-251.
Proceedings
Blake, J.I., G.L. Somers, and G.A. Ruark. 1990. Perspectives on process modeling of forest growth responses to environmental stress. P. 9-20 in Proc. of conf. on Process modeling of forest growth responses to environmental stress, Robert K. Dixon (ed.). Timber Press, Portland, OR.
Technical report
Personal Communication John Helms, pers. Comm., University of California-Berkeley, Aug. 10, 2006.
Fischer, W.C., and A.F. Bradley. 1987. Forest ecology of western Montana forest habitat types. USDA Forest Service Gen. Tech. Rep. GTR-INT-223, Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, Ogden, UT. 95 p.
Thesis/dissertation
Korol, R.L. 1985. The soil and water regime of uneven-age interior Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii var. glauca). M.Sc. thesis, Univ. of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada. 164 p.
Web publications
USDA Forest Service. 2002. The process predicament: How statutory, regulatory, and administrative factors affect national forest management. Available online at www.fs.fed.us/publications.html; last accessed Apr. 15, 2005.
Tables and Figures
All tables and figures must be cited in numerical order in the text. Place each table and figure on a separate page with its title at top. Place table titles and figure captions together at the end of the manuscript.
Tables
Format
Table files should be uploaded after the main document before figure files
Upload each table as a separate Word file
Tables should be in portrait orientation no more than 7 inches wide and 9.66 inches tall.
Titles, column heads, and side heads should be in initial cap and lowercase.
Figures
Figures must be submitted as separate high-resolution EPS, TIFF, or JPG files.
Figure files should be uploaded after the main document and tables
Supplemental Materials
Authors may upload supplementary data for online-only publication. Supplementary materials are not essential but are specifically relevant to their article and may help readers better understand their work, particularly if available in a format (e.g., data sets, video or audio files, maps, other images, detailed calculations or equation derivations, examples, source code or programs, statistical analysis code) not conducive for a printed outlet. There is a 10 MB limit to supplemental files.
Supplemental material(s) are not edited or peer-reviewed; it is therefore the authors' sole responsibility to ensure that supplemental materials are accurate. Reference to each piece of supplemental material should be made in proper context in the text of the article, with an "S" placed in front of each reference (e.g., Table S1, Figure S2, Video Clip S3).
A list of supplementary materials should be provided by the authors following the Literature Cited section with a descriptive, one-line caption included for each unique supplement. Examples:
Examples of Supplementary Materials
Supplement 1. Video clip of modified skyline logging system using new rigging structure in steep terrain.
Supplement 2. FORTRAN code of program developed to simulate different stress loads of modified skyline logging system under different wind conditions, soil conditions, and types of timber.
Supplement 3. R program written to conduct nonlinear ordinary least squares regression on modified skyline logging productivity function.
All files uploaded as supplements should have their preferred version of the commercial software listed, and if possible be presented in formats that can be read in free, publicly available programs (e.g., PDF or ASCII files for text documents rather than those in a native (proprietary) word processor or spreadsheet format). Supplementary data should not contain certain types of files, such as executable files (e.g., *.exe, *.com) or those script or macro files (e.g., *.vbs) or compressed files (e.g., *.zip).
Rights and Permissions
Oxford University Press publishes Forest Science on behalf of the Society of American Foresters.
Upon receipt of accepted manuscripts at Oxford University Press, authors will be invited to complete an online copyright license to publish form. It is a condition of publication for all Oxford Journals that authors grant an exclusive license to Oxford University Press or the sponsoring Society.
Please note that by submitting an article for publication you confirm that you are the corresponding/submitting author and that Oxford University Press ("OUP") may retain your email address for the purpose of communicating with you about the article. You agree to notify OUP immediately if your details change. If your article is accepted for publication OUP will contact you using the email address you have used in the registration process. Please note that OUP does not retain copies of rejected articles.
Preprint policy
Authors retain the right to make an Author’s Original Version (preprint) available through various channels, and this does not prevent submission to the journal. For further information see our Online Licensing, Copyright and Permissions policies. If accepted, the authors are required to update the status of any preprint, including your published paper’s DOI, as described on our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
