Common tern

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Onglets

Description

Distinguishing features

More slender than a gull, the common tern has long straight wings, a forked tail and a black crown and nape. That is why these terns are sometimes called “sea swallows”.

The body of the common tern is white. The upper sides of the pearl grey wings have blackish tips. The straight, pointed bill is orange-red, with a black tip.

Reproduction

This tern nests in a slight depression in the ground, often lined with twigs, pebbles or other debris. The female generally lays 2 or 3 eggs. Incubation lasts 22 or 23 days.

The pair mates for more than one season and tends to return to the same site year after year.

Diet

Common terns eat small fish, crustaceans and insects. When hunting for food, they fly quickly and nimbly over the water, bill pointed downward. After hovering in place briefly, they dive down from a height of about 3 m, head first, and seize their prey near the surface.

Predators

The adults and young are eaten by foxes, minks, skunks, great horned and long-eared owls and night herons.

Egg gathering and vandalism by humans can affect populations of this species.

Habitat

Common terns frequent freshwater and saltwater coastlines around the globe. They usually nest close to a large body of water, on a low island partially covered in short vegetation or on a spit of sand or gravel.

Ecology, behaviour

These birds migrate over long distances. An individual banded on the coast of Brazil on April 22, 1991 was found on June 18, 1993 near a colony in the Magdalen Islands!

In a marine environment, they may form noisy colonies of hundreds of individuals. In the early 20th century, common terns were threatened with extinction because their feathers were so popular for women's fashions. Since that time, populations have recovered.

French name

Sterne pierregarin

Scientific name

Sterna hirundo

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Birds

Order

Charadriiformes

Family

Laridae (gulls)

Size

Length: 33 to 40.5 cm; wingspan: 78.7 cm

Weight

120 g

Life span

Average: 25 years in nature

Status

Least concern

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