LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN GULLS AND TERNS. 263 



of 'sailor's button.'" Professor Jones (1903) identified the follow- 

 ing species of fishes dropped on their breeding grounds : 



Sand launce {Avvniodytes americanus) , cunner {Tautogolabrus adsperus), 

 mullet {Mugil curema), pollock {PoUachius virens), flounder (Pseudopleuro- 

 nectes americanus), and young herring (species not determined). Of all the 

 food the sand launce comprised not less than SO per cent. 



Behavior. — The flight of the roseate tern is exceedingly light and 

 graceful ; it is the greyhound of its tribe, the longest, slenderest, and 

 most highly specialized of the terns. As it floats along, with its long 

 tail feathers streaming out behind, it seems to cleave the air with 

 the greatest ease and swiftness, like a slender-pointed arrow. Its 

 downward plunges into the water for its prey are swift and accurate ; 

 it often goes beneath the surface and generally emerges with a 

 tiny minnow in its bill. Its shape and movements will generally 

 serve to identify it, and if near enough, its black bill is a good 

 field mark. 



Its voice, however, is the surest means of identification, for it is 

 entirely unlike that of the other terns with which it associates. Its 

 alarm note seems entirely out of keeping with its grace and beauty 

 of form and color, for it is harsh and grating, a prolonged rasping 

 cry, like the syllables " kreck " or " crack " or " kraak," louder and 

 on a lower key than the cries of other terns. Mr. Brewster (1879) 

 has likened this note of excitement or anger to the sound made 

 "by forcibly tearing a strong piece of cotton cloth." He also ob- 

 serves that its usual note is " a soft mellow hew-it, repeated at fre- 

 quent intervals," which I have recorded in my notes as " kulick," a 

 musical note heard on its breeding grounds when undisturbed. 

 This is usually in soft conversational tones, mingled with a variety 

 of cackling, chattering, and gurgling notes. 



The roseate tern is intimately associated on its breeding grounds 

 with the common tern, the laughing gull, the Cabot's tern, and the 

 sooty tern in different portions of its range, all of which species 

 seem to live with it in reasonable peace and harmony. It is gen- 

 erally a peaceful and harmless neighbor, even friendly and sym- 

 pathetic at times in helping to care for the young of others. At other 

 times it seems to be very pugnacious, attacking and severely mauling 

 a strange young one which wanders too near its own young, or 

 quarreling with other adults of its own or other species. On Muske- 

 get its chief enemy used to be the short-eared owl, a pair of which 

 lived on the island and raised havoc among the terns; the owls were 

 finally killed, however, in the cause of bird protection. Cats have 

 been brought to the island, where they did so much damage that 

 they, too, were removed. Marsh hawks and crows occasionally visit 

 the islands and probably kill some young terns. 

 174785—21 18 



