Guidelines for authors

GENERAL FORMAT

1. Manuscripts can be submitted in Spanish or English. If the authors' native language does not correspond to the language in which they present the manuscript, it must be reviewed by a native speaker of the respective language before being submitted. Manuscripts that are not adequately written will be returned to the corresponding author without being reviewed.

2. Manuscripts must have a Resumen in Spanish and an Abstract in English.

3. Write the manuscript in the first person and use the active voice (eg, 'We carried out this study' instead of 'This study was carried out').

4. Submit text files in DOCX format.

5. Set the manuscript page in letter size (21.59 "x 27.94 cm") and with a space of 2 cm for all margins.

6. Prepare the manuscript in Times New Roman font, size 12, left-aligned and single-spaced (see editorial guidelines.)

EDITORIAL GUIDELINES

Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología publishes scientific contributions of original articles derived from research studies, thematic reviews, and brief communications on birds that are distributed in Mexico and the Neotropics in general. These studies should be relevant to understanding patterns and processes in the biology and ecology of birds, and contribute to conservation of their populations and habitats.

The manuscript in Spanish or English must be accompanied by a cover letter indicating that the material is original, has not been published or is not submitted to another journal for publication, and that all authors have read the manuscripts and agreed with its content and submission to the journal (see our Code of Ethics, Responsibilities of authors). Authors must specify in their cover letter that the manuscript submitted for publication in Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología is proposed as an original article or as a brief communication. Original articles can be derived from research studies, thematic reviews, or analytical opinions. If the study involved the collection of specimens, the manuscript must refer to the scientific collection permit number granted by the competent authority, in addition to mentioning that all the ethical procedures for capture, collection and handling of specimens were followed in accordance with the NOM-062-ZOO-1999 for studies in Mexico.

As Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología is an electronic journal, the entire process, from manuscript submission to publication, will be carried out electronically. The manuscript and supplementary material must be submitted via the journal´s OJS platform, where a unique processing number will be assigned to the manuscript that must be referred to in all communications. All contributions will be submitted for review by external peers, with the coordination of an Associate Editor; although it should be clarified that both the Editor in Chief and Associate Editor can reject a manuscript in the first instance.

Copyright

Authors will retain all rights to the content of their article published in Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología, but they authorize the journal to publish and disseminate their article by both electronic and printed means, known or unknown, either directly or through third parties.

Instructions for authors

Authors should carefully read and follow these instructions when preparing their manuscript. Manuscripts that do not follow these editorial guidelines will be returned to the corresponding author without being reviewed.

General guidelines

Manuscripts can be submitted in Spanish or English. If the authors' native language does not correspond to the language in which they present the manuscript, it must be reviewed by a native speaker of the respective language before being submitted. Manuscripts that are not properly written will be returned to the corresponding author without review.

The manuscript should be written in the first person and use the active voice (eg, 'We carried out this study' instead of 'This study was carried out').

In Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología for manuscripts written in Spanish, the demonstrative pronouns éste, ése, aquél and their feminine and masculine plurals are accentuated. The word ‘sólo’ is accentuated when it is an adverb (sólo existen un par de especies) but not when it is an adjective (no me gusta estar solo).

Main text of the manuscript should be submitted in Word with a .doc or .docx extension. Pages should be letter size (21.59 x 27.94 cm) and with margins of 2 cm. Use Times New Roman 12-point font, with left-aligned and single spaced text. Page numbering should be on the bottom, right-hand side of the page.

Do not use footers.

The scientific names of the species should be written in full the first time they are used in the text, thereafter, the generic name can be abbreviated, unless it is written at the beginning of a sentence. Scientific names should be italicized, without underlining, and accompanied by their common name the first time it is mentioned both in the Title or Abstract, and in the text of the manuscript. Common names in Spanish should be those proposed by Berlanga et al. (2019).

 https://www.biodiversidad.gob.mx/media/1/ciencia-ciudadana/documentos/Lista_actualizada_aos_2019.pdf.

The scientific names of the species (and if it is the case, the common names in English) and their phylogenetic order must correspond to that established by the AOU and supplements in its electronic portal <https://americanornithology.org/>. The only exception to the phylogenetic order in the presentation of species will be if another congruent logical order is used. Arranging species by alphabetical order is not acceptable. Use subspecies level and taxonomic authority only when relevant.

The following Latin terms must be in italics: fide, vice versa, sensu, in vivo, in vitro, in situ, ad libitum, a priori, a posteriori. Other terms, with the exception of scientific names, should not be italicized.

Proper names should not be abbreviated, except in the case of established abbreviations such as CONANP, CONABIO, SEMARNAT, which must be defined in the document at first use.

Numbers from zero to nine should be written-out in letters, but in Arabic numbers if they are associated with units of measurement (eg, we made two visits of 5 min each in the 15 sites). Write numbers when beginning a sentence (eg, twenty-two species breed at study site). Use a comma to separate thousands (eg, 150,000 individuals), except for years, and meters above sea level. Separate the decimals with a point (eg, 10.5 km). Precede decimal fractions with a zero (eg, 0.95). Consistently use the same number of decimal places throughout the manuscript. The number of decimal places should be consistent with the context of the manuscript, but normally no more than two decimal places are sufficient.

Use measures and abbreviations considered in the International System (IS). Standard statistical abbreviations such as: ANOVA, ANCOVA, MANOVA, GLM can be used.

Use 24-hour format to specify the time of day (eg, 18:00 h; not 6:00 p.m.). When describing sampling periods, it is preferrable to standardize this with respect to sunrise or sunset, to avoid confusion due to Daylight Saving Time.

Statistical format:

n (sample size)

df (degrees of freedom)

P (probability value)

CI (confidence interval)

CV (coefficient of variation)

SE (standard error)

SD (standard deviation)

Manuscripts submitted to Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología should consist of a single file, although figures may be sent as independent files. The manuscript and its correct sequence should include:

1) Manuscript text

1. Frontpiece
2. Resumen and keywords in Spanish
3. Abstract and keywords in English
4. Introduction
5. Methods
6. Results
7. Discussion
8. Acknowledgments
9. Cited literature

2) Tables

3) Figure legends

4) Figures

5) Supplementary Material

1) Manuscript text

The correct sequence of sections of the text of the manuscript submitted for publication as an original article or scientific note is Frontpiece, Resumen in Spanish and palabras clave, Abstract and Keywords, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgments and Literature cited. In the case of thematic reviews, it is not necessary to divide the text of the manuscript into the Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion sections; the division of the manuscript into sections is free, but must have a logical and congruent sequence.

Each new paragraph should have an indentation of 1.25 cm, except for the first paragraph that follows the section title. The title of each section should be written in bold and on a separate line (Resumen, Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgments, Literature cited). If subtitles are required, they must be written in italics and also on a separate line.

a) Frontpiece (Page 1)

Include 1) the title of the manuscript in Spanish and English (should not exceed 10 words), 2) a short title, in the language of the manuscript, of no more than 40 characters (including spaces), 3) names of the author(s), and 4) their affiliations at the time of carrying out the research, followed by the mailing address of affiliation. Separate each of these four parts by a line. Include the email address of the corresponding author below their affiliation details, and the ORCID registration of all authors.

Write the title of the manuscript in uppercase and lowercase, bold and centered. For more than one author, the name [name (s) and surname (s)] must be followed by an Arabic number in superscript format that refers to their affiliation and postal address. In case of a change of affiliation, the current affiliation and address may also be included. The name of the author for correspondence should be marked with an asterisk (*) that refers to their email address.

b) Resumen and Palabras claves (Page 2)

All manuscripts must contain an abstract in Spanish and another in English, each one followed by the keywords in the respective language. The words Resumen and Abstract, as well as Palabras Clave and Keywords must be written in bold and in a single line. The abstract should be concise, but sufficiently informative and understandable without the need to refer to the text. It should be explicit about the problem addressed, what was done, the main results obtained, and what was concluded. The Abstract should have the following structure: a concise introductory sentence that sets out the research framework, 1-2 sentences on methods (sites, habitat, sampling), the main part of the abstract should present the most important results, and the abstract should conclude with a concise sentence highlighting the relevance of the results and their contribution to knowledge. Abstracts should be no more than 250 words for an original article and 150 words for a brief communication. Up to a maximum of eight and a minimum of five keywords may be provided, which must be different from those used in the title of the manuscript.

c) Abstract y keywords in English

The Abstract in English and Resumen in Spanish should each be a precise translation of the other, presenting the same information. For manuscripts written in English, the Abstract should be presented first, followed by the Resumen in Spanish.

d) Introduction

The introduction should present the problem to be addressed, the conceptual context of previous studies, as well as the justification for the study. Do not include in the Introduction species descriptions or general natural history information that can be consulted in Birds of the World. The objectives of the study, or research question, and if applicable, the study hypotheses, should be specified at the end of the Introduction.

e) Methods

Methods should sufficiently detailed to enable others to reprocate the study, or evaluate the validity of the data and analysis, as wel as the relevance of the findings, and scope of the results. This section may include a subsection that describes the study area, and if applicable, the sampling design and statistical analyzes. It should be specified in Methods whether the values reported in the Results section correspond to the mean ± SE, SD, or CI. The level of significance (α) used in the statistical tests must also be specified.

f) Results

This section should include only the results pertinent to the hypothesis or question posed in the Introduction, and in the order in which the objectives were stated and Methods presented. Text in Results should not repeat information provided in tables or figures. The term 'significant' should be used only to refer to a significant result of a statistical test, which must be presented with the value of the test, degrees of freedom, and P values. The same number of decimal places should be used for means and SE, SD or CI (eg, 38.9 ± 1.2 and not, 38.9 ± 1.23).

g) Discussion

It is convenient to begin the Discussion by summarizing the main results. The Discussion should develop the meaning and relevance of the results, and contextualize them within the state of current knowledge or previous studies on the subject. This section should have a logical sequence analogous to that of Results. Discussions and conclusions should be centered on the results found and presented in the study. Unfounded speculation should be avoided.

h) Acknowledgments

For individuals, only use the initials of the first name or names and write-out his or her surnames. In the case of institutions or funding sources, write the name in the original language, not translated. The reviewers of the manuscript should be acknowledged.

i)Lliterature Cited

It is the responsibility of authors to verify that citations in the text and Literature Cited correspond to the format established in the journal’s editorial guidelines. Each reference cited in the text, without exception, must be included in Literature Cited and vice versa. Cite the references in the text as Gómez and Zuria (2012) or in parentheses (Gómez and Zuria 2012). Do not use commas between the author and the year, but use a comma between different citations from the same author or from different authors (CONABIO 1998, 2013). Write citations in the text in chronological order, and use lower case letters to specify different works by the same author and from the same year (eg, Newton and Rothery 2001, Boere et al. 2007a, 2007b). For citations with three or more authors, write the surname or surnames of the first author followed by et al. and then the date (eg, Puebla-Olivares et al. 2002).

In the Literature cited section, write the references in alphabetical order according to the last name of the first author and then in chronological order (from the oldest to the most recent edition, in the case of the same author). Use 1 cm French indentation. Do not abbreviate the journal name and use only the volume number. Do not include unpublished, in preparation, or submitted manuscripts. Citation format is as follows:

Journal publication

Sardà-Palomera F, Puigcerver M, Brotons L, Rodríguez-Teijeiro JD. 2012. Modelling seasonal changes in the distribution of Common Quail Coturnix in farmland landscapes using remote sensing. Ibis 154:703-713.

Domínguez-López ME, Ortega-Álvarez R. 2014. The importance of riparian habitats for avian communities in a highly human modified Neotropical landscape. Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad 85:1217-1227.

Sánchez-González LA. 2013. Cuando un “nuevo registro” es realmente un nuevo registro: consideraciones para su publicación. Huitzil Revista Mexicana de Ornitología 14:17-21. https://doi.org/10.28947/hrmo.2013.14.1.170

Books

AOU (American Ornithologists’ Union). 1998. Check-list of North American birds, 7a. ed. American Ornithologists’ Union. Washington, D.C., USA.

Stattersfield AJ, Crosby MJ, Long AJ, Wege DC. 1998. Endemic bird areas of the world. Priorities for biodiversity conservation. BirdLife Conservation Series No. 7. Birdlife International. Cambridge, United Kingdom.

Book chapters

Navarro Siguenza AG, Sánchez-González LA. 2003. La diversidad de las aves. Pp. 24-85. In Gómez de Silva H, Oliveras de Ita A (eds.). Conservación de aves. Experiencias en México. CIPAMEX, NFWF, CONABIO. Mexico.

Snow DW. 2001. Family Momotidae (motmots). Pp. 264-285. En del Hoyo J, Elliot A, Sargatal J (eds.). Handbook of the birds of the world, vol. 6: mousebirds to hornbills. Barcelona, Spain: Lynx Ediciones.

Thesis

Bravo-Cadena J. 2008. Selección de áreas prioritarias para la conservación de aves en Hidalgo, México. B.Sc Thesis. Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Hidalgo, Pachuca, Hidalgo, Mexico.

Fraga RM. 1986. The Bay-winged Cowbird (Molothrus badius) and its brood parasites: interactions, coevolution, and comparative efficiency. Ph.D. Thesis. University of California, Santa Barbara, California, USA.

Government publications

SEMARNAT (Secretaría de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales). 2010. Norma Oficial Mexicana NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010, Protección Ambiental – Especies nativas de México de flora y fauna silvestres – Categorías de riesgo y especificaciones para su inclusión, exclusión o cambio – lista de especies en riesgo. Diario Oficial de la Federación. 30 de diciembre de 2010, Segunda Sección. Mexico City, Mexico.

Internet

Cite internet sources only if they are relevant and reasonably permanent. Include the date when the source was consulted.

Winkler H, Christie DA. 2020. Gray-breasted Woodpecker (Melanerpes hypopolius), version 1.0. In del Hoyo J, Elliott A, Sargatal J, Christie DA, de Juana E (eds.). The birds of the world. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Lab of Ornithology. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.grbwoo1.01 (accessed 25 January 2022).

 

2) Tables

Each table and figure should be presented on a separate page. Prepare tables in the Word processor; they should be as concise as possible, should be understandable without reference to the text, and should not duplicate information in the text. Each table should start on a separate page and be numbered with Arabic numerals in bold (eg, Table 1.) in the same order in which they are mentioned in the text. Include a brief descriptive title that is sufficiently explanatory, at the top of the table. Tables should not use vertical lines or shading; only horizontal lines at the beginning and end of the table, and to delimit the column headings. Column titles should be in bold.

3) Figure legends

4) Figures

Figures should be clear, easily understandable without reference to the text, and should not duplicate information in the text. Figures must meet the following specifications:

Acceptable formats for figures are: JPEG (or JPG), TIFF. or as a last resort in PDF.

Image resolution 300 dpi and size 1000 x 1000 pixels.

Files must be less than 1 MB in size.

Figures with multiple components (ie 1A, 1B ...) must be integrated as a single figure.

Since the publication is electronic, figures can be produced in color if deemed appropriate.

Use preferably solid colors.

The text within figures should be in Times New Roman and of adequate size for clear reading after reducing the figure in the published version of the article.

Provide corresponding explanations for symbols or codes used.

Figures should speak for themselves.

List figures with Arabic numerals in the order in which they are cited in the text (eg, Figure 1). Text in figures should not repeat information mentioned in the text of the manuscript or in the tables, but should be explicit enough to understand the figure without referring to the text.

5) Supplementary material

Supplementary material may be included with the manuscript. Supporting information may consist of additional tables and figures, databases, field formats, audiovisual materials, among others. This information will be made available via the Internet together with the PDF of the article once it is published.