Journal of Cultivated Plants

Our focus

We focus on cultivated plants with all their facets. All published contributions have a strong connection to applied research and emphasize the importance and opportunities of the findings for agricultural and horticultural practice.

Our topics

In the domain of crop plant research, we welcome contributions from all relevant fields, e.g. soil science, plant cultivation and grassland management, horticulture, fruit growing and viticulture, plant genetics and plant breeding, plant protection, plant health, and agricultural engineering.

Information for our readers

To ensure that articles published in the Journal of Cultivated Plants are available online as soon as possible, rather than having to wait for an issue to be published, from 2024 there will now be one online issue per year, which will be continuously filled with articles. This issue will not be printed. In addition, as in the past, we will publish an irregular number of thematic issues with a collection of articles on current developments in crop research, which will also be published in print in addition to the online edition. More information on how to obtain these issues can be found in the "For Readers" menu.

Our sections

We publish original papers, review papers and short communications in German and English. The editorial section of the journal also contains news, book reviews and information on people or from relevant professional associations.

Our standards

All submitted original articles, review articles and short communications - regardless of whether they are intended for special issues or regular issues - will be evaluated by at least two independent reviewers in an anonymous peer-review process.
With the help of the free software Open Journal Systems, the editorial process from submission and peer review to the publication of articles is transparent and can be viewed online by all participants at any time.
The Journal of Cultivated Plants is indexed in Web of Science (ESCI), Scopus (Elsevier), CAB Abstracts, AGRICOLA (Online Catalog of the USDA National Agricultural Library), EBSCO, LIVIVO (ZB Med Search Portal for Life Sciences), and BASE (Bielefeld Search Engine).

Our open access policy

We publish all scientific articles open access, at no cost to the authors. This means, we do not charge any APCs. All original papers, reviews, and short communications have been published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY 4.0) since 2019, with authors retaining copyrights. In addition to the online version of the annual issue, thematic issues of the Journal of Cultivated Plants are also published in print.

Our readers

In addition to the interested public, our readers primarily include researchers and students at universities, colleges, and state and federal research institutions. Our journal is also read by agricultural and horticultural consultants, employees of chambers of agriculture, plant protection services, and institutes and experimental stations for plant cultivation and plant breeding. Many interested readers of our journal can also be found in the relevant industry.

Our history

The first issue of the Journal of Cultivated Plants was published under the title "Nachrichtenblatt für den deutschen Pflanzenschutzdienst" in 1921 and served to provide rapid information on all developments and recommendations in the field of plant protection. In a slightly modified form, the journal title was retained until 1990 in both the FRG and the GDR. After reunification, the "Nachrichtenblatt des deutschen Pflanzenschutzdienstes" was published by the Biologische Bundesanstalt (BBA). In 2008, a reorganization of federal research took place and the BBA and two other departmental research institutions (FAL and BAZ) were merged into the newly founded Julius Kühn Institute (JKI). In the course of this, the Nachrichtenblatt was renamed "Journal für Kulturpflanzen"/"Journal of Cultivated Plants" - also because the range of topics was greatly expanded. In addition to plant protection, the journal now also covers soil science, crop production and grassland management, horticulture, fruit growing and viticulture, plant genetics and plant breeding, plant health, and agricultural technology. A year later, in 2009, the journal "Pflanzenbauwissenschaften", published by the Gesellschaft für Pflanzenbauwissenschaften (GPW), was merged with the Journal of Cultivated Plants. Until 2021, two issues per year have been published as a special issue of "Pflanzenbauwissenschaften." All issues of the "Nachrichtenblatt des deutschen Pflanzenschutzdienstes" from 1950 to 2008 can be found here.