Species: Hydroprogne caspia

Caspian Tern

Species

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Encyclopedia of Puget Sound

A large stocky tern with a stout orange to coral red bill, grayish flight feathers, white underparts, and a moderately forked tail; adult has black cap in breeding season; immature and adults in basic plumage have a dusky or streaked crown; average length 53 cm, wingspan 127 cm (NGS 1983).

Articles:

Avian flu comes to the Salish Sea

A new strain of avian flu has been sweeping the globe since 2020, leaving thousands of dead seabirds in its wake. This past summer, it arrived at a colony of Caspian terns at Rat Island in the Salish Sea, with catastrophic results.

A person wearing a Tyvek suie and orange vest standing on a beach next to two full garbage bags. Water, land, and blue sky in the distance

Advances in technology help researchers evaluate threatened Puget Sound steelhead

New, smaller acoustic tags will allow scientists to track steelhead migrations in Puget Sound in ways that were once impossible. Will they provide answers to the mysterious decline of these now-threatened fish?

A steelhead (Oncorhynchus mykiss) in the Cascade River, WA, 2014. Photo: © Morgan Bond http://www.morganhbond.com/

Classification

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Craniata

Class

Aves

Order

Charadriiformes

Family

Laridae

Genus

Hydroprogne

NatureServe

Source:
ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.104635

Classification

Other Global Common Names

Charrán Caspia - sterne caspienne

Informal Taxonomy

Animals, Vertebrates - Birds - Other Birds

Formal Taxonomy

Animalia - Craniata - Aves - Charadriiformes - Laridae - Hydroprogne - but separated on the basis of genetic data that correspond to plumage patterns (Bridge et al. 2005).

Ecology and Life History

Migration

true - true - true - Great Lakes population winters along shores of Gulf of Mexico (Evers 1992).

Non-migrant

true

Locally Migrant

true

Food Comments

Eats mainly fishes obtained at surface of water by diving from air; sometimes feeds from surface like a gull and eats eggs and young of other terns and gulls (Terres 1980).

Reproduction Comments

Along the U.S. mid-Atlantic coast, nesting begins by late May or early June. Clutch size usually is 2-3. Incubation, by both sexes, lasts 20-22 days. Young are tended by both parents, leave nest in a few days, first fly at 4-5 weeks. Parental care (feeding) may extend up to 5-7 months after fledging. Nests singly or usually in colonies of up to several thousand pairs (5000+ at Sand Island, Washington).

Ecology Comments

Nonbreeding: often rests with flocks of other terns. At a colony at the mouth of the Columbia River, 50% of adults foraged within 8 kilometers and 90% foraged within 21 kilometers (Collis et al. 1999); at other colonies, some adults travel long distances to obtain food; up to 50 kilometers on Lake Michigan (Cuthbert and Wires 1999) and 29-60 kilometers in another reported case (Gill 1976). At expanding colonies on the Pacific Coast, birds exhibited low natal philopatry (Collis et al. 1999), but elsewhere adults show strong fidelity to colonies (Cuthbert 1988).

Length

Weight

661

Conservation Status

NatureServe Global Status Rank

Global Status Last Reviewed

1996-11-27

Global Status Last Changed

1996-11-27

Distribution

Conservation Status Map

Global Range

FG - 20,000-2,500,000 square km (about 8000-1,000,000 square miles) - FG - BREEDS: Eastern U.S.: locally on Atlantic and Gulf coasts, from Virginia to northern Florida (very few), also recently in New Jersey, on the central Gulf Coast of Florida, and in southeastern Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas; and around the Great Lakes. Canada: Labrador, southeastern Quebec, and Newfoundland; Great Lakes region in southern Ontario; southern Manitoba and central Saskatchewan, along shores of Lake Winnipeg, Lake Winnepegosis, and Dore Lake; in Lake Athabasca in northeastern Alberta; and vicinity of Great Slave Lake in southern Mackenzie. In western North America: locally (mostly in interior but on coast in Washington and California) in Washington, eastern Oregon, northern Utah, northwestern Wyoming, Idaho (recent range expansion), and North Dakota, south to southern California and western Nevada; also Baja California and Sinaloa. WINTERS: southern U.S. (mainly coastal areas north to California and North Carolina) south to Mexico; sometimes to northern South America (Colombia, Venezuela), rarely in the West Indies. Casual in Hawaii. Breeds and winters extensively also in the Old World (Africa, Eurasia, Australian region).

Global Range Code

Global Range Description

20,000-2,500,000 square km (about 8000-1,000,000 square miles)

ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.104635