The Editors decided, during the year, that there was really little need for a Short Communications Section and it would be more effective to incorporate short papers into the body of the Journal. Great thanks therefore go to Martyn Gorman for his many years as Editor of the Communications from the Mammal Society and latterly for his editing of the Short Communications.

By the end of 2000, the majority of the members of the Editorial Board had completed a five year term and an editorial decision was taken to replace the Board with a small team of international Editorial Consultants who would be asked to act as ambassadors for the Journal as well as giving advice on editorial matters. I should therefore like to thank all the retiring members of the Editorial Board for their work on the Journal and welcome the new Editorial Consultants whose names are given on the inside front cover of this issue.

During 2000, 160 papers were published in the twelve monthly parts of volumes 250–252 and there was approximately eleven months between acceptance of a paper and its publication. Our aim is to reduce this time to a maximum of ten months from now on.

Over the year, 286 manuscripts were submitted to the Journal and reports were written on them by 471 referees, whose names are listed below. As in previous years, I should like to make full acknowledgement of the generosity of these referees in both their time and expertise, without which the Journal could not survive. I should also like to thank all the authors who have sent in colour slides for possible reproduction on the covers.