Elegant tern

Identification

This medium-large tern has a long, slender, slightly downcurved orange bill, pale gray upperparts, white underparts, and black legs. In winter the forehead becomes white, but a black smudge remains in front of the eye. The black crest extends through the eye, unlike the royal tern where it stops at the eye.

The call is a loud grating noise. It can be confused with the royal tern, which is larger and thicker-billed with more white on the forehead in winter, or with the lesser crested tern, but differs in having a pure white rump, marginally paler upperparts, and a longer, more slender, slightly downcurved bill. Juveniles have a scalier pale gray back.

Ecology and conservation

The elegant tern nests in a ground scrape, laying one or two eggs. It relies on dense nesting (often only 20–30 cm apart) and proximity to more aggressive species like Heermann's gulls to deter predators, though Heermann's gulls do take some eggs and chicks. Larger western and yellow-footed gulls are more significant predators. In May 2021, a drone crash landing at Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve caused 1,500 nests with thousands of eggs to be abandoned, leading to catastrophic loss.

Did You Know?

• The genus name Thalasseus comes from Greek Thalassa, meaning 'sea', and elegans is Latin for 'elegant, fine'.
• The closest relative of the elegant tern is Cabot's tern (Thalasseus acuflavidus), which breeds on the Atlantic coasts of the Americas.
• The first European record was at Carlingford Lough in County Down, Northern Ireland, in late June 1982.