Topic Selection & Fit (conbio-topic-selection)

Conservation Biology publishes science that changes how biodiversity is conserved. The bar is not "new for this site" — it is "novel, transferable, and consequential for conservation." Use this skill to pressure-test fit before you invest.

When to trigger

• Choosing among possible projects or framings for a Conservation Biology submission
• A reviewer/colleague said the work feels "local," "descriptive," or "not generalizable"
• Deciding between a Contributed Paper and a Research Note
• Considering an Essay, a Review, or Conservation Practice and Policy

The Conservation Biology fit test

A strong submission usually clears all four:

1. Direct conservation relevance. The result bears on a real decision: what to protect, how to manage, what to restore, which threat to prioritize. State the conservation problem first.
2. Novelty + transferability. It advances theory, method, or evidence in a way that travels beyond the focal taxon, site, or system. A finding others can use, not a one-off case report.
3. Sound on its own scientific terms. Ecological, statistical, or social-science methods done rigorously and matched to the question (see conbio-study-design).
4. A clean, answerable scope. Sharp enough to answer convincingly within the article-type word cap.

Reach beyond your study system

If your work is…	reach the field by…
a single-site / single-species study	drawing the general mechanism or decision rule it informs
a method/tool development	showing the conservation questions it newly answers, with a worked case
a policy or management analysis	generalizing the lesson so other programs can apply it
a synthesis	identifying the trend or consensus that reshapes practice

Article-type choice

• Contributed Paper — full empirical study, IMRAD, broad relevance (~6,000–7,000 words).
• Research Note — one focused or preliminary contribution (~3,000 words). Do not pad into a paper.
• Review — comprehensive synthesis of a well-developed literature (~7,500–8,000 words).
• Essay — a forward-looking, evidence-grounded argument on a conservation issue (~6,000 words).
• Conservation Practice and Policy — applied tools, policy, or management lessons (~5,000 words).

Anti-patterns

• "First record / first study in region X" as the whole contribution (descriptive, local-only)
• A clever model or method with no conservation payoff
• A sound study whose result would not change any conservation decision
• Choosing Contributed Paper length out of habit when a Research Note would land harder

Fit pass for Conservation Biology

Use this as a second-pass capability check. First lock the species/system threat, conservation decision, and uncertainty relevant to action; then test whether the manuscript addresses conservation-science reviewers who ask whether evidence changes biodiversity, management, or policy action.

• Primary move: Score fit, novelty, evidence readiness, and audience ownership; reject prestige-only targeting when a sibling venue owns the contribution.
• Decision ledger: return claim / evidence / blocker / next edit rows so the next pass can patch the manuscript directly.
• Neighbor test: compare against Biological Conservation for applied conservation breadth, Global Change Biology for climate/ecosystem process, Ecology Letters for theory-forward ecology; if the neighboring outlet has the stronger audience claim, recommend re-routing before polishing.
• Submission-ready gate: before final advice, re-open resources/official-source-map.md for upload-week rules and name the one live-check item that could change the recommendation.

Output format

【Question】one sentence
【Conservation problem】the decision or threat it informs
【Novelty + transferability】what advances and who else can use it
【Article type】Contributed Paper / Research Note / Review / Essay / Practice & Policy
【Fit verdict】strong / needs reframing / off-fit (why)
【Next】conbio-literature-positioning

Supplementary resources

• ../../resources/external_tools.md — conservation data sources by domain
• ../../resources/official-source-map.md — article types and scope