Bay Nature magazine is composed primarily of the work of freelance contributors and volunteers. We welcome story queries and image submissions from anyone working in the San Francisco Bay Area. We pay, though not a lot, for items published in the print magazine, most of which also appear on this website. At this time, we do not pay for web-only content.

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Guidelines for Writers

BAY NATURE is a quarterly magazine dedicated to the intelligent and joyful exploration of the natural places, plants, and wildlife of the San Francisco Bay Area. It contains writing, photography, art, and cartography about the natural history of the land and waters of the nine counties ringing the Bay, as well as significant nearby areas(such as the Delta and Monterey Bay). We are a nonprofit enterprise, sponsored by the Bay Nature Institute in Berkeley, California.

Neither scientific journal nor travel guide, BAY NATURE's aim is to foster a deeper connection between the Bay Area’s residents and our surrounding landscapes. We do this by examining local nature from a variety of angles and in a wide range of voices, in a manner that is both accessible and intelligent, serious and playful. We see BAY NATURE as a forum that brings together the local environmental, literary, artistic,and political communities, and serves the shared goal of conserving and restoring our natural heritage.

Our audience: the dedicated naturalist, committed environmentalist,occasional birdwatcher, recreational hiker and bicyclist, as well as the general reader who cherishes the beauty and natural diversity of the place we live.

Each issue of BAY NATURE contains both features and recurring departments and columns(see below); most of the content is provided by freelance writers.

Our standards are high: we seek writing that is informed, provocative,literary, and elegant. Our subject matter includes virtually any aspect of the Bay Area's natural history, as well as its human history as it relates to the environment. It can be as broad as wildflowers and marine mammals and as specific as the Tiburon paintbrush and the gray whale, as majestic as towering redwoods and as basic as bay mud arthropods. While we do not require that writers be natural scientists,it is important that our stories be accurate, comprehensive, and well-researched.

Although we work with writers already known to us for high-quality and dependable writing, we also aim to find and stimulate new contributors who speak passionately for and about Bay Area nature. For writers who are new to us, we generally work on speculation.

If you are interested in being published in BAY NATURE, please send us a written query (e-mail is preferred); relevant writing samples are most welcome. If you wish to have this material returned to you, please so note and send a self-addressed stamped envelope.

Our articles and features generally range from 700-3,000 words. The fee we pay depends on a variety of factors, including the experience of the writer and the amount of time and research required to complete the piece. The fee may be lower if the piece requires extensive editing and re-writing. We generally pay within 30 days of publication.

We purchase first-time world rights, except in rare cases of excerpts from recently-published books. (First-time rights include right to publish the material on the BAY NATURE website: www.baynature.org.)

Send materials for consideration to:

David Loeb, Publisher, or
Dan Rademacher, Editor
BAY NATURE
1328 Sixth Street #2
Berkeley, CA 94710
david@baynature.org
dan@baynature.org

Departments

BAY NATURE has several recurring "departments" for which we solicit freelance submissions. (Note: not all departments appear in each issue.) They include:

• "On the Trail" highlights a particular park, trail, or shore that can be visited by readers. This is not intended as a trail guide, but rather an evocative description of a special place at a specific season or moment in time,or an exploration of a particularly interesting aspect of the place. 

• "Conservation in Action" takes us to the front lines of conservation and restoration work, with stories of volunteer crews planting native wildflowers, monitoring bluebird nest boxes, or pulling out invasive weeds in places as varied as eastern Contra Costa County or the Bayview District in San Francisco.

• "Signs of the Season" focuses on a particularly characteristic species, group of species, or phenomenon for the season in which the issue will appear (wildflowers in spring, fog in summer, fungi in winter, etc.).

• "Families Afield"takes a kid-friendly approach to one topic, phenomenon, or species each quarter. A regular sidebar covers three to five top nature-related things to do with kids—outdoors at parks and open spaces or indoors at museums and science centers—in the coming months.

• "First Person"lets us hear directly from scientists, historians, and regular people who have a special or distinctive insight into one of the topics we're covering elsewhere in the issue.

• "The Way It Was"takes our readers on an outing into the Bay Area's past to see what it was like before it became a major metropolis, through excerpts from historical writings, field notes from scientific expeditions, and vivid first-person accounts.

We encourage you to read past installments of these departments. Browse our back issues to find those.

Literary Essays, Fiction, and Poetry Inspired by Bay Area Nature

BAY NATURE is seeking submissions for a new, twice-annual "Literary in Nature" feature.

We are looking for poems, essays, and short fiction. Prose pieces should be approximately 1,600 words or fewer, inspired by the natural world of the San Francisco Bay Area. Though much of our content is focused on natural history interpretation, in this feature we aim to take a more expansive view of "nature writing" to include well-crafted and insightful personal narratives, thoughtful essays, and relevant fiction. With the possible exception of historical fiction, we are not seeking genre fiction (sci-fi, mystery, etc.). The writing can be lyrical, contemplative, humorous, serious, as long as the author's voice is authentic and original.

Poems, of approximately 20-30 lines, should feature some aspect of Bay Area nature. Many poems use nature as background or as symbol, but what we are looking for are poems in which nature is subject. The treatment can be reverent or humorous, narrative or contemplative, microscopic or macroscopic. Submitting poets should be intimately familiar with the region, its flora and fauna, and refer to these as specifically as possible in each poem submitted. We appreciate the mature poetic voice.

Our audience: the dedicated naturalist, committed environmentalist, occasional birdwatcher, recreational hiker and bicyclist, as well as the general reader who cherishes the beauty and natural diversity of the place we live.

Fee for a published poem is $100; fees for prose pieces range from $500 to $800. We plan to publish the "Literary in Nature" feature twice per year. Since we often plan a year ahead, time between submission and publication can vary from two to twelve months. Given that, simultaneous submissions are fine, though we would want to be informed if a piece we accept has since been published in another venue.

Send submissions to:

Dan Rademacher, Editor
BAY NATURE
1328 Sixth Street #2
Berkeley, CA 94710
dan@baynature.org (email preferred)

Guidelines for Photographers

BAY NATURE is a magazine dedicated to the intelligent and joyful exploration of the natural places, plants, and wildlife of the San Francisco Bay Area. Published quarterly, it contains writing,photography, and art about the natural history of the land and waters of the nine counties ringing the Bay and other nearby areas (including the Delta, Santa Cruz, and Monterey Bay). We see BAY NATURE as a forum that brings together the local environmental, literary, artistic, and political communities, and serves the shared goal of conserving and restoring our natural heritage. We are a nonprofit enterprise,sponsored by the Bay Nature Institute in Berkeley, California.

Each issue of BAY NATURE contains both features and recurring departments and columns; most of these are accompanied by photography and/or artwork. From time to time, we will also publish photo spreads or essays with minimal text. We do not see photography simply as "decoration" for our text, but rather as a vital component in achieving the magazine's mission of exploring the nature of the Bay Area from a wide variety of perspectives, and of seeing our natural heritage with new eyes. We are interested in photography that is not only skillful but also conveys an underlying understanding of the subject, and a new way of looking at it. We are interested in both color and black-and-white photography. Our preferred medium for publication is high-quality transparency or high-quality,high-resolution digital files.

Almost all photographic content in BAY NATURE is provided by freelance contributors from stock images, for which we purchase one-time publication rights; we rarely do photography by assignment. We maintain a list of freelance photographers who receive a quarterly "Photo Needs Bulletin" detailing the specific stories in the upcoming issue. To be added to the list, please send an email,including a description of your work and web link or one or two low-resolution samples, to our editor at the email below.

Photographers may submit images on speculation; they should be high-quality dupes, with appropriate caption and photographer identification on each image, and accompanied by a self-addressed,stamped envelope. Photo CDs (viewable on Mac platform) are also a good way of showing us your work. Please do not send images electronically,except in response to the photo bulletin or a specific request from us.We cannot accept responsibility for lost or damaged material sent on speculation.

All material should be sent to:

Dan Rademacher, Editor
BAY NATURE
1328 Sixth Street #2
Berkeley, CA 94710
dan@baynature.org

We very much appreciate your interest in BAY NATURE and in sharing your work with our readers.

Guidelines for Illustrators

BAY NATURE is a magazine dedicated to the intelligent and joyful exploration of the natural places, plants, and wildlife of the San Francisco Bay Area. Published quarterly, it contains writing,photography, and art about the natural history of the land and waters of the nine counties ringing the Bay and other nearby areas (including the Delta, Santa Cruz, and Monterey Bay). We see BAY NATURE as a forum that brings together the local environmental, literary, artistic, and political communities, and serves the shared goal of conserving and restoring our natural heritage. We are a non-profit enterprise,sponsored by the Bay Nature Institute in Berkeley, California.

Each issue of BAY NATURE contains both features and recurring departments and columns; most of these are accompanied by photography and/or artwork. From time to time, we will also publish photo or art spreads or essays with minimal text. We do not see images simply as "decoration" for our text, but rather as a vital component in achieving the magazine's mission of exploring the nature of the Bay Area from a wide variety of perspectives, and of seeing our natural heritage with new eyes.

Artwork in BAY NATURE includes a mix of commissioned works and spot illustrations for which we purchase one-time publication rights. We maintain a list of freelance illustrators who receive a quarterly "Artwork Needs Bulletin" detailing the specific stories in the upcoming issue. To be added to the list, please send an email,including a description of your work and web link or one or two low-resolution samples, to our editor at the email below.

Artists may submit images on speculation; high-quality prints, with appropriate caption and artist identification on each image, and accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Photo CDs (viewable on Mac platform) are also a good way of showing us your work.Please do not send images electronically, except in response to the artwork bulletin or a specific request from us. We cannot accept responsibility for lost or damaged material sent on speculation.

All material should be sent to:

Dan Rademacher, Editor
BAY NATURE
1328 Sixth Street #2
Berkeley, CA 94710
dan@baynature.org

We very much appreciate your interest in BAY NATURE and in sharing your work with our readers.