Description
 Forster's tern is a medium-sized, slender tern. It is
13-15
inches in length with a wingspan of
30-31
inches. It has white undersides, throat, and breast; a light gray back; and white-tipped gray wings. It has a black cap on its head, a deeply forked gray tail, orange legs and feet, and a long orange bill with a black tip. In the winter, it loses the black cap on its head, its bill turns black and it has black patches on its eyes and side of its head. Males and females look alike.
Range
 Forster's tern breeds along the Atlantic Coast from Massachusetts south to Florida, on the California coast, on the Gulf Coast, along the Great Lakes, and in scattered locations in western Nevada, southern Idaho, northern Utah, northern and eastern Colorado, and the Midwest,
and south central Canada.
It winters along the Pacific Coast south to Central America and along the Atlantic Coast from Virginia south to the Caribbean.
Habitat
Forster's tern breeds on freshwater and saltwater marshes and estuaries. In the winter, it is found on marshes, lakes, rivers and beaches. |
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Diet
 Forster's tern eats
small fish.
It flies over the water and then dives below the surface to snatch up its prey. It also eats insects from the surface of the water.
Life Cycle
 Forster's tern nests in colonies.
The nest
is
an unlined scrape in the mud or sand, or it is a platform of dead grass and marsh vegetation. It may also build its nest on a
muskrat house! The female lays 3-4 eggs and the male and the female incubate the them for 24 days. Both parents care for and feed the chicks.
The chicks fledge when they are 27-30 days old but stay with their parents until they migrate in the fall.
Behavior
 Forster's tern is the only tern species that is found in only in North America. It is named after
Johann Reinhold Forster, a German naturalist who accompanied Captain Cook on his second voyage around the world from 1772-1775.
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