WATER BIRDS. 63 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Strikingly like Forster's Tern, except in two respects. The breast and belly are light 
gray as in the Common Tern and the outer web of the outer tail feather is darker than the 
inner web, in this respect also resembling the Common Tern. On the other hand the 
Arctic Tern has a decidedly longer tail, which averages 74 inches, and the bill is all red 
with no black on the tip (both the Common and Forster’s Tern have dusky tipped bills). 
The adults and young of the year are with difficulty separable from corresponding plumages 
of the other three species. Length, 14 to 17 inches; wing, 10 to 10.75; tail, 6.50 to 8.50 
(forked for 4 or 5 inches); culmen, 1.08 to 1.40. 
24. Least Tern. Sterna antillarum (Lesson). (74) 
Synonyms: Little Tern, Minute Tern, Sea Swallow.—Sternula antillarum, Less., 
1847.—Sterna minuta, Wils., 1818, Aud., 1838, and others.—Sterna frenata, Gamb., 1848, 
Lawr., 1858, Baird, 1859.—Sterna superciliaris, Coues, 1872. 
Recognizable by its small size, yellow bill and feet, and deeply forked 
tail. In size and general coloration it resembles the Black Tern in im- 
mature or winter plumage, but the latter always has black bill and feet 
and the short tail is but slightly forked. 
Distribution.—Northern South America, northward to California, 
Minnesota, and New England, and casually to Labrador, breeding nearly 
throughout its range. 
This dainty little seabird is almost or quite unknown in Michigan at 
the present time, but there is some reason to believe that it once occurred 
regularly although in small numbers. It is included in Dr. Miles’ List 
of 1860 on the authority of Prof. Fox who is said to have taken a specimen 
at Grosse Isle, Detroit River. There is also a mounted specimen in the 
University of Michigan Museum at Ann Arbor, labeled “ Michigan” which 
may have been taken in that vicinity. In the MS. notes of A. B. Covert 
there is a record of a male taken at Sandshore Lake, Ann Arbor, May 4, 
1873, as well as “three specimens (two males and one female) taken at 
Bayport, Huron county, October 13, 1878.” None of these specimens 
can be located, however, and it is not impossible that they were in reality 
fall specimens of the Black Tern, which has been mistaken repeatedly for 
the present species. The Barron collection at Niles was said to contain 
a specimen of the Least Tern, but a personal examination by the writer 
in November, 1905 failed to reveal any such specimen, although a single 
Black Tern in fall plumage, and without label, was found. A skin of an 
adult male in breeding plumage, from the Gunn collection, is now in the 
Kent Scientific Museum in Grand Rapids, but bears on the label (apparently 
the collector’s label) ‘Short-tailed Tern, Warsaw, Ill.” The Albion 
record credited to O. B. Warren by Cook proves to be erroneous. 
It formerly nested sparingly about some of the small lakes in northern 
Indiana, and possibly may do so still. Dr. Wheaton reported it as of 
irregular occurrence along the Lake Erie shore in Ohio, and there are several 
old records for southern Ontario. This species has disappeared almost 
completely during the last thirty years from places in southern New Eng- 
land, where it was once abundant, but within the past few years a few pairs 
have reappeared here and there, and possibly, if well protected, it may 
reestablish itself in the Lake Region. 
Its habits are similar to those of the Common and Arctic Terns, with 
which it frequently associates, and it prefers to nest on sandy or pebbly 
islands where its three or four eggs are laid in a little hollow scooped in the 
