Royal Tern

IDENTIFICATION: The largest of the common tern species in Puerto Rico. It has a relatively thick orange bill and a short, forked tail. It has a black cap in breeding season, but the black is reduced to the back of the head most of the year. Length: 45-50 cm.; weight: 350-450 g.

VOICE: A shrill, grinding call. Audio (M. Oberle).

HABITAT: Coastal marine waters; nests on isolated sandbars and islands.

HABITS: Dives for small fish (averaging 6-7 cm.), crabs, squid and shrimp. Sometimes it steals fish from other terns. During courtship in April and May, the male parades around the female, displaying his fish catch. Both sexes scrape a nest on a sandy beach in the nesting colony, often near other seabirds. Both sexes incubate a single, heavily-spotted, cream-colored egg (rarely two eggs in a clutch) for 30 days, and both feed the young. Often the young of a colony gather in a group called a creche. Despite the crowd, the parents can recognize their own young. Young fledge about 30 days after hatching. Laughing Gulls prey on the ternsÆ nests.

STATUS AND CONSERVATION: A commonly seen bird in coastal Puerto Rico between November and April, but only about 450-800 pairs actually nest in the Caribbean. In addition to local breeding populations, migrants from North America winter in Puerto Rico. Royal Terns banded in Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas have been recovered in Puerto Rico. The only confirmed breeding in Puerto Rico has been on rocky islands around Culebra, where up to 400 pairs have nested. However, for unknown reasons, those colonies have been greatly reduced since 1988, to just a handful of pairs nesting sporadically. Shifting of colony sites to the Virgin Islands may have occurred, but has not been corroborated.

RANGE: Temperate and tropical coasts of West Africa and in the Americas from New England south to Peru and northern Argentina. A common species in San Juan Harbor, over Puente Moscoso, Laguna San José, Laguna Torrecilla, Mayagüez Bay, and Boquerón Bay.

TAXONOMY: CHARADRIIFORMES; LARIDAE; Sterninae

Photo: B. Hallett

Photo: G. Beaton

Photo: G. Beaton

Photo: A. Sßnchez Mu±oz

Photo: R. Rodrφguez Mojica

Photo: G. Beaton

References

Bent, A.C. 1921. Life histories of North American gulls and terns. Smithsonian Instit. U.S. National Museum Bull. 113. (Reprinted by Dover Press, 1963).

Buckley, P. A., and F. G. Buckley. 2002. Royal Tern (Sterna maxima). In The Birds of North America, No. 700 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Birds of North America, Inc., Philadelphia, PA.

Chardine, J. W., R. D. Morris, J. F. Parnell, and J. Pierce. 2000. Status and conservation priorities for Laughing Gulls, Gull-billed Terns, Royal Terns and Bridled Terns in the West Indies. Pp. 65-79 in Status and conservation of West Indian seabirds (E. A. Schreiber and D. S. Lee, eds.). Soc. Carib. Ornith., Special Pub. No. 1.

Dammann, A.E. and D.W. Nellis. 1992. A natural history atlas to the cays of the U.S. Virgin Islands. Pineapple Press, Sarasota, FL.

del Hoyo, J., A. Elliott, and J. Sargatal, eds. 1996. Handbook of Birds of the World, Vol. 3. Hoatzin to Auks. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Ehrlich, P.R., D.S. Dobkin, and D. Wheye. 1988. The birderÆs handbook: a field guide to the natural history of North American birds. Simon and Schuster/ Fireside, NY.

Harrison, P. 1983. Seabirds: an identification guide. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.

Harrison, P. 1987. A field guide to seabirds of the world. Stephen Greene Press, Lexington, MA.

Quintana, F. and P. Yorio. 1997. Breeding biology of Royal and Cayenne Terns at a mixed-species colony in Patagonia. Wilson Bull. 109:650-662.

Raffaele, H.A. 1989. A guide to the birds of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Princeton.

Raffaele, H.A. 1989. Una guía a las aves de Puerto Rico y las Islas Vírgenes. Publishing Resources, Inc., Santurce, PR.

Raffaele, H.A., J.W. Wiley, O.H. Garrido, A.R. Keith, and J.I. Raffaele. 1998. Guide to the birds of the West Indies. Princeton.

Saliva, J.E. 1994. Vieques y su fauna: Vieques wildlife manual. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Boquerón, PR.

Schreiber, E. A. and D. S. Lee. 2000. West Indian seabirds: a disappearing natural resource. Pp. 1-10 in Status and conservation of West Indian seabirds (E. A. Schreiber and D. S. Lee, eds.). Soc. Carib. Ornith., Special Pub. No. 1.

Schreiber, E. A. 2000. Action plan for conservation of West Indian seabirds. Pp. 182-191 in Status and conservation of West Indian seabirds (E. A. Schreiber and D. S. Lee, eds.). Soc. Carib. Ornith., Special Pub. No. 1.

Sorrie, B.A. 1975. Observations on the birds of Vieques Island, Puerto Rico. Carib. J. Sci. 15:89-103.

Wiley, J. W. 2000. A bibliography of seabirds in the West Indies. Pp. 192-225 in Status and conservation of West Indian seabirds (E. A. Schreiber and D. S. Lee, eds.). Soc. Carib. Ornith., Special Pub. No. 1.

Royal Tern, Spanish text

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