Antarctic tern
Antarctic tern | |
---|---|
File:Sterna vittata - Antarctica I.jpg | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | |
Phylum: | |
Class: | |
Order: | |
Family: | |
Genus: | |
Species: |
S. vittata
|
Binomial name | |
Sterna vittata Gmelin, 1789
|
Lua error in Module:Taxonbar/candidate at line 22: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).
The Antarctic tern (Sterna vittata) is a typical tern. It ranges throughout the southern oceans. It is very similar in appearance to the closely related Arctic tern, but is stockier, and the wing tips are grey instead of blackish in flight. It is, of course, in breeding plumage in the southern summer, when the Arctic tern has moulted to its non-breeding plumage (though this is not useful for separating it from another species, the South American tern).
Breeding takes place from mid-November to early December. Chicks hatch from December to February. Skuas and jaegers are the primary predators of this bird's eggs and young.
The total global population of this bird is around 140,000 individuals.
Subspecies
There are six listed subspecies of the Antarctic tern.[2]
- S. v. tristanensis (Murphy, 1938) – Tristan da Cunha & Gough Island
- S. v. sanctipauli (Gould, 1865) – St. Paul & Amsterdam Islands.
- S. v. georgiae (Reichenow, 1904) – South Georgia, South Orkney & South Sandwich Islands
- S. v. gaini (Murphy, 1938) – South Shetland Islands, Antarctic Peninsula & nearby islands
- S. v. vittata (Gmelin, 1789) – Prince Edward, Crozet, Kerguelen, Bouvet & Heard Islands
- S. v. bethunei (Buller, 1896) – Stewart, Snares, Auckland, Bounty, Antipodes, Campbell & Macquarie Islands
Description
The Antarctic tern is a small bird at 31–38 cm (12-15 inches) long. Its bill is usually a dark red or blackish. It is mainly pale grey and white, but has a black cap when breeding. In non-breeding plumage it has a grizzled crown and white forehead. The tips of this tern's wings are greyish black.
The plumage of juveniles is white on the belly, foreneck, forehead, and breast. The back is grey and the bill is black. Immature birds have plumage similar to adult terns.
References
- Ian Sinclair, Phil Hockey and Warwick Tarboton, SASOL Birds of Southern Africa (Struik 2002) ISBN 1-86872-721-1
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sterna vittata. |
- Antarctic tern - Species text in The Atlas of Southern African Birds
- The Antarctic tern at Birdlife International accessed August 25, 2006
- Pages with broken file links
- IUCN Red List least concern species
- Commons category link is locally defined
- Antarctic birds
- Sterna
- Birds of South Africa
- Birds of Western Australia
- Birds of New Zealand
- Birds of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
- Birds of Africa
- Animals described in 1789
- Fauna of the Kerguelen Islands
- Fauna of the Prince Edward Islands
- Fauna of subantarctic islands
- Fauna of Campbell Island, New Zealand
- Fauna of Heard Island and McDonald Islands