Cotinga Editorial Guidelines, June 2026

Cotinga, the annual journal of Neotropical Birding and Conservation (NBC), publishes studies on Neotropical birds. The accent of Papers and Short Communications is on new distributional and temporal information, including new country records, new data concerning biology (particularly breeding) and novel interpretations concerning taxonomy, particularly descriptions of new taxa. Cotinga does not consider papers on aberrant plumages or diet. All submissions or enquiries should be sent to the Senior Editor, Juan Freile: [email protected]. The editors reserve the right to reject any submissions that do not conform to the guidelines presented here.

Submissions in English, Spanish or Portuguese are considered and accepted subject to editing and refereeing. Scientific and vernacular names should appear together at the first mention of a species, after which either can be used alone; and names/taxonomy should preferably follow AviList (avilist.org). For Papers (but not Short Communications) written in English, an alternate-language summary (usually in Spanish, but in Portuguese or French as relevant) is required. Authors unable to provide this should prepare the text in English and apply to the editors for assistance.

Submissions in a language by non-fluent authors should be proofread by someone fluent in that language; the Editorial Board reserves the right to reject manuscripts that are unintelligible or show no signs of proofreading. AI tools cannot fulfil requirements for authorship. Texts primarily written with Artificial Intelligence (AI) models will be rejected, as will those detected as total or partial plagiarism, or as fraud. In the Methods and/or Acknowledgements sections, authors must declare transparently and in detail the use of AI assistance in writing or in enhancing clarity and readability. Content interpretations and final decisions, however, must be the sole responsibility of authors. Authors must properly reference information generated by AI tools and guarantee that that they have not plagiarised other material. The final decision about whether use of AI-generated content will be accepted lies with the Editorial Board.

Contributors of submissions describing the avifauna of a particular region/locality that includes a species list should provide an evidence category denoting whether a species was recorded on the basis of a sight record, audio-recording, photograph or specimen. References should be cited in alphabetical order at the end of the paper, in the style of the current issue of Cotinga. Websites, academic theses and unpublished reports are acceptable as references, but should be cited only in extremis. Authors should send all graphics files as .jpg (300 dpi); never save graphics inside MS Word or similar word-processing package. Long tables are best treated as appendices. Any author wishing to submit a map should discuss this with the Senior Editor before submission: we cannot accept copyrighted material (e.g., Google Maps/Earth imagery) and strongly advise authors to use alternative non-copyrighted sources for mapping (e.g., OpenStreetMap, USGS Satellite Imagery). It is the author’s responsibility to follow each source’s attribution guidelines and terms of use.

All contributions are subject to peer review, by two or exceptionally one independent referees. The Editorial Board reserves the right to make changes that it deems necessary, and, in the minimum of cases, without prior reference to the author. Authors will receive an electronic proof to check. It is assumed that all contributors understand and accept these conditions.

Any person submitting a manuscript, visuals or other materials for publication in Cotinga must own all relevant intellectual property (IP) rights. On submission, all IP rights in text will be assigned to NBC and a perpetual, royalty-free licence will be granted to NBC to print and use visuals. It is authors’ responsibility to ensure that all relevant rights can be transferred or licensed to NBC. Where this is not possible, authors should make NBC aware of any restrictions on the use of materials and will be responsible for any loss to the NBC resulting from any infringement or alleged infringement of the intellectual property rights of any third party. Any rights transferred or licensed to the NBC as described above shall revert to the author or authors or be cancelled (as applicable) only in the event of rejection or withdrawal of the manuscript.

Neotropical Birding and Conservation’s biannual journal Cotinga provides a forum for news, notices, recent publications, expedition results, reviews and publication of studies on Neotropical birds by contributors from all parts of the world. The accent of papers and short notes is on new distributional and temporal information, including new country records, new data concerning biology, particularly breeding, and novel interpretations concerning taxonomy, particularly descriptions of new taxa. Cotinga does not consider papers on aberrant plumages or diet. Contributions in English, Spanish or Portuguese are considered and accepted subject to editing and refereeing.

For Neotropical News/Notebook and Reviews, the deadline for submission is 1st December (February issue) and 1st June (August issue). The deadlines do not apply to main articles, which will be published as soon as possible after acceptance by the Editorial Committee.

Copies of new journals, books or reports for mention or reviewing are always welcomed. All contributions or enquiries should be sent to: