Guide to writing for Natur Cymru – Nature of Wales

First of all, THANK YOU for agreeing to contribute content to Natur Cymru
for INCC. If you have any questions please get in touch with me on
lizzie.wilberforce@incc.wales or 07794 811132.

Please note that in writing for Natur Cymru, you ultimately retain the rights to your own work and images. If you are writing as part of your job, those rights will probably be retained by your employer. However, unless you inform us otherwise, we will assume that you are happy to donate to us:

  • First British Serial Rights (that is, we are the first to publish the written material that you contribute)
  • An exclusive right to the written material for 6 months from the date of physical publication (that is, you do not use your work elsewhere until 6 months after the magazine comes out)
  • Non-exclusive rights to images provided (that is, you may also use them for any other purpose at any time)
  • A non-exclusive right thereafter to use, store, publish or transmit your contribution in internal and External Archives and databases including but not limited to CD-ROMs and websites published by us and/or third party database and/or archive publishers (that is, you may use your material again after 6 month have passed but we may also still use it for the above purposes).
  • Please ensure you have the rights to any images that you provide to us.

Notes on content

1. PERSONAL DETAILS
Please include your phone number and email address so that we can contact you quickly if necessary, and your postal address so we can send you a published copy.

For publication (all articles): Please give us the name you wish to be credited by, and if you are writing on behalf of your employer, the name of your employer and your job title.

For feature or long articles: please also include a short biographical description of yourself to go at the end of your article – 15-20 words.

2. WRITING CONTENT
The best way to judge the style of the magazine is to look at past copies. Natur Cymru has evolved a distinctive voice. It provides authoritative, up-to-date information about species and habitats and their management, reports on pioneering work and the latest discoveries, and makes the
connections between these environmental stories and the wider social and environmental agenda, presenting them in an interesting and readable way.

  • Feature articles – around 2000-2500 words.
  • Long articles – around 1200-1600 words
  • One-page articles – around 400 words

Please avoid (or explain) jargon and acronyms where possible- readership is varied, and may not be familiar with the language that we often get used to within our own working spheres.

All forms of punctuation are welcome, especially the full stop! If you have a sentence longer than 30 words, think seriously about dividing it in two.

2. TITLES AND HEADINGS
Please look for titles which excite interest, rather than trying to encapsulate a whole article in the title: eight words maximum. We always include a subtitle to expand on the title in the contents page, and sometimes follow the title with this above the article, so it is helpful if you can provide
a subtitle.

Consider breaking up the text (easier on the reader’s eye) by:

  • using sub-headings every few paragraphs
  • using bullet points or tables of information.

3. CAPITALS AND ACRONYMS
Generally the first letter of common names of plants and animals should be in lower case unless it includes a personal name (e.g. otter, but Daubenton’s bat). Adding the latin name on the first mention of that species will remove any potential confusion arising from species names containing adjectives e.g. large pale clothes-moth Tinea pallescentella.

Acronyms – at the first mention, write the name in full followed by the acronym in brackets, then use the acronym after. Exception are e.g. RSPB, which is well known by its initials and there is no need to use the name in full.

4. SCIENTIFIC NAMES
Where used, the scientific name in italics (without brackets or commas) will normally follow the first use of the common name, but not be repeated, e.g. sea beech Delesseria sanguinea. If there is no doubt which species a common name refers to, there is no need to add the scientific name.
If there is no common name, the scientific name will stand alone.

5. FORMATTING
Please DO NOT use any formatting, such as footnotes or text boxes, insetting paragraphs etc. The magazine is designed using specialised software and any formatting that you put in a Word document will have to be undone by us. The exception is using italics for Latin names.

If you need to use footnotes or text boxes or any other non-standard formatting, please write instructions in square brackets:

  • footnote in main text[1] (with the footnote text to go at the end of your article)
  • [BOX] place your text here [END BOX]

Tables – We can use very simple tables set up in Word, but anything more complicated will have to be sent separately as a high resolution file.

6. ILLUSTRATIONS
Most authors provide us with digital images to illustrate their articles, so please do this if you can.
Exceptionally, you may send us slides or prints for scanning, and also tables, graphs, artwork, maps and logos.

Please include, for each image:

  • the photographer’s name/copyright holder – make sure you have full copyright permission for reproducing any images and forward any necessary consents to us
  • a description or caption to help us identify what we are looking at, although captions can also provide valuable and concise additional information

Send digital images as separate files (jpegs, tifs etc). We cannot use images embedded in a Word document. The images need to be at high resolution for printing, so please send the highest resolution you have available.

Submitting content

Large files can be sent by email (up to 25Mb) either singly or zipped. We also accept content via
WeTransfer or other file sharing sites, but if you choose to send them in this way, please ensure you warn us you are doing so in case the notification is spammed! We will always send an email of acknowledgement on receipt of content, though it may take 3 working days to do this.

Thank you, and we hope you enjoy writing!