Bridled tern
| Bridled tern | |
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| Adult on Lady Elliot Island, Australia | |
| Scientific classification | |
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O. anaethetus
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| Binomial name | |
| Onychoprion anaethetus (Scopoli, 1786)
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| Synonyms | |
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Sterna anaethetus Scopoli, 1786 |
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The bridled tern (Onychoprion anaethetus, formerly Sterna anaethetus - see Bridge et al., 2005) is a seabird of the tern family Sternidae. It is a bird of the tropical oceans.
Contents
Description
This is a medium-sized tern, at 30–32 cm in length and with a 77–81 cm wingspan similar to the common tern in size, but more heavily built. The wings and deeply forked tail are long, and it has dark grey upperparts and white underparts. The forehead and eyebrows are white, as is a striking collar on the hindneck. It has black legs and bill. Juvenile bridled terns are scaly grey above and pale below.
This species is unlikely to be confused with any tern apart from the similarly dark-backed sooty tern and the spectacled tern from the Tropical Pacific. It is paler-backed than that sooty, (but not as pale as the grey-backed) and has a narrower white forehead and a pale neck collar.
Distribution and movements
This bird is migratory and dispersive, wintering more widely through the tropical oceans. It has markedly marine habits compared to most terns. The Atlantic subspecies melanopterus breeds in Mexico, the Caribbean and west Africa; other races occur around the Arabian Peninsula and in Southeast Asia and Australasia, but the exact number of valid subspecies is disputed. It is a rare vagrant to western Europe. These are the four subspecies listed by the IOC:
- O. a. melanopterus – (Swainson, 1837): Caribbean and West Africa.
- O. a. antarcticus – (Lesson, 1831): Red Sea, Persian Gulf and western Indian Ocean.
- O. a. anaethetus – (Scopoli, 1786): eastern Indian, and Pacific Oceans.
- O. a. nelsoni – (Ridgway, 1919): west coast of Mexico and Central America.
Breeding
This species breeds in colonies on rocky islands. It nests in a ground scrape or hole and lays one egg. It feeds by plunge-diving for fish in marine environments, but will also pick from the surface like the black tern and the gull-billed tern. It usually dives directly, and not from the "stepped-hover" favoured by the Arctic tern. The offering of fish by the male to the female is part of the courtship display.
Various views and plumages
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Bridled Tern.jpg
Bridled tern, at rookery
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Bridled tern.jpg
Juvenile on Lady Elliot Island, Queensland, Australia
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Bridled Tern flight LEI jan08.JPG
In flight Lady Elliot Island, Queensland, Australia
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Juvenile Bridled Terns Wings.jpg
Juveniles at Perth Zoo
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Juvenile Bridled Tern Splashing.jpg
Juvenile bathing at Perth Zoo
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Bridled Tern from the Crossley ID Guide Britain and Ireland.jpg
ID composite
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Bridled Tern Sterna anaethetus Mumbai by Dr Raju Kasambe.JPG
Bridled Tern at Mumbai, Maharashtra, India.
References
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<references />, or <references group="..." />- Bridge, E. S.; Jones, A. W. & Baker, A. J. (2005): A phylogenetic framework for the terns (Sternini) inferred from mtDNA sequences: implications for taxonomy and plumage evolution. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 35: 459–469. PDF fulltext
- Bull, John L.; Farrand, John Jr.; Rayfield, Susan & National Audubon Society (1977): The Audubon Society field guide to North American birds, Eastern Region. Alfred A. Knopf, New York. ISBN 0-394-41405-5
- Collinson, M. (2006). Splitting headaches? Recent taxonomic changes affecting the British and Western Palaearctic lists. British Birds 99(6): 306-323.
- Olsen, Klaus Malling & Larsson, Hans (1995): Terns of Europe and North America. Christopher Helm, London. ISBN 0-7136-4056-1
- Kasambe, R. Thakor, P., Dudhe, N. and Mane, P. (2014): Recent sighting records of
Bridled Tern Sterna anaethetus in Mumbai (Maharashtra) and Surat (Gujarat). Newsletter for Birdwatchers. 54(1): https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/46/Bridled_Tern_Sterna_anaethetus_in_Mumbai_and_Surat.pdf
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Onychoprion anaethetus. |
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Wikispecies has information related to: Onychoprion anaethetus |
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- Pages with broken file links
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- IUCN Red List least concern species
- Commons category link is locally defined
- Birds of Puerto Rico
- Onychoprion
- Birds of Western Australia
- Birds of Southeast Asia
- Birds of Pakistan
- Birds of Mexico
- Birds of Africa
- Birds of South Africa
- Animals described in 1786
- Birds of North Africa
