58 MICHIGAN BIRD LIFE. 



TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 



"Tail forked; legs and feet black. Summer adult: Head and upper neck uniform 

 plumbeous, bordered below by a black collar; mantle deep bluish-gray; quills (primaries) 

 black, the five innermost ones varied with white and plumbeous; rest of plumage white; 

 bill black tipped witli yellowish. Winter adult: Similar, but head and neck white except 

 ear coverts and back of head and neck, which are dull, dusky plumbeous. Young : Mantle 

 brownisli gray, each feather darker subterminally, and margined at tip with pale fulvous 

 or buffy; tail white, with a broad black band near end, this again narrowly tipped with 

 white; upper tail coverts and entire lower parts white." (Ridgway). 



Length, 13 to 14 inches; wing, 10.10 to 11.15; tail, 4.50 to 5 (forked for about .60 to 

 1.00); culmen, 1; tarsus 1.25. 



19. Caspian Tern. Sterna caspia (Pall.). (64) 



Synonyms: Imperial Tern. — Sterna caspia, Pall., 1770, Lawr., Baird, Coues, Ridgw. 



Readily separated from any but the Royal Tern by its large size, and 

 from the Royal Tern by its slightly forked tail. 



Distribution. — Nearly cosmopolitan; in North America breeding south- 

 ward to Virginia, Lake Michigan, Texas, Nevada, and California. 



This beautiful tern is far from common in Michigan waters. A few are 

 seen spring and fall on lakes Erie, Huron, and Michigan, and colonies of 

 the birds have long been known to nest on certain islands belonging to 

 Delta county, Michigan, lying in the entrance from Lake Michigan to 

 Green Bay, and also on certain of the Beaver Islands, belonging to 

 Charlevoix county, Michigan. At both these places the birds have been 

 persecuted from time immemorial by fishermen and Indians who use their 

 eggs as well as those of other terns and gulls for food, and unless better 

 protection is afforded, the extinction of the colonies cannot be long post- 

 poned. The nests are placed on gravelly or shingly islands, are usually 

 pebble-lined, and the two or three eggs (rarely four) are very variable in 

 ground color, ranging from grayish white to pale olive, and more or less 

 thickly spotted with brown and black, the spots commonly small and 

 distinct. The eggs average 2.66 by L77 inches. 



Doubtless nesting begins in May, but owing to the relentless persecution 

 of the eggers few young are hatched until late in June, and the writer found 

 fresh eggs and newly hatched young on the Beaver Islands July 11, 1904, 



In Michigan at least the Caspian Tern seems always to nest in com- 

 munities, several hundred pairs nesting on the same island. Its flight 

 is remarkably strong, and it has the appearance of being very short-tailed. 

 Its note is a very harsh "squawk" entirely different from that of any sea- 

 bird of our acquaintance; once heard it can scarcely be mistaken after- 

 ward. Like all other terns this bird feeds mainly, if not entirely, on fish 

 which it secures by plunging headlong into the water in the manner of the 

 Kingfisher and Fish Hawk, oftentimes going completely out of sight 

 beneath the water. 



TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 



Whole top of head from bill to occiput, extending below the eyes, jet-black; remainder 

 of head and neck, together with breast and entire under parts, snowy-white; mantle pearl- 

 gray. Primaries mostly gray with darker tips, the area extending farther toward the 

 base on the inner web than on the outer, the shafts pure white. Bill coral-red with a more 

 or less dusky tip. Feet and legs black. After the nesting season is over the black of the 

 crown becomes flecked with white and in winter the amount of white increases until the 

 top of the head is streaked black and white. The young in the first winter are pale grayish 

 above with some dusky spots on the back and inner secondaries; the top of head mixed 



