Nov., 1919 THE ELEGANT TERN AS A BIRD OF CALIFORNIA 231 
Sterna elegans was originally described by William Gambel (Proc. Acad. 
Nat. Sci. Phila., 1848, p. 129), who himself ‘‘procured this species on the Paci- 
fie coast of Mexico, particularly at Mazatlan at the mouth of the Gulf of Cali- 
fornia’’. Some subsequent authors who credited the species to ‘‘California’”’ 
or the ‘‘coast of California’’, may have merely inferred this, or may have care- 
lessly transcribed the term California, alone, from Gambel’s statement as just 
quoted. In the case of Coues (Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1862, p. 540), who 
credits the Elegant Tern to the ‘‘Coast of California’’, without remark, it is of 
course possible that specimens taken in California were at hand. But if so, no 
other, or more exact, reference has been made to them in print. Not until 
1868 was specific evidence given, of specimens having been actually secured 
within the state of California as now defined. 
The first well-founded ascription of the Elegant Tern to California, then, 
insofar as known to me, was that by Cooper (Proc. Calif. Acad. Sci., 1v, 1868, p. 
10). The statement made by this author is as follows: ‘‘The first specimens 
I have seen from this State were shot by Mr. Lorquin in S. F. Bay, and are in 
fine plumage.’’ It is to be inferred that two or more examples were encoun- 
tered, but no dates or further facts are given. The whereabouts of Lorquin’s 
birds, if they still exist, are unknown to me. 
Belding apparently never himself met with this species, but he states 
(MS, ‘‘Water Birds’’, 1897): ‘‘Mr. J. C. Parker has a specimen, shot at San 
Diego, he informed me, in summer.’’ The phrase ‘‘in summer’’ is so vague 
that it cannot safely be used in any seasonal study of the species. 
As a result of his own observations upon the water birds of Monterey Bay 
in the fall of 1896, Mr. Leverett Mills Loomis makes record (Proc. Calif. Acad. 
Sei., 3rd ser., Zool., 11, 1900, pp. 279, 287, 293, 319) of Elegant Terns as follows: 
September 22, a pair was noted ‘‘flying along the bay shore toward Point 
Pinos’’. October 9, offshore north of Monterey ‘‘a band of eight’’ was de- 
coyed into close range, ‘‘and in another place, one of seven.’’ October 29, 
three were met with, resting on a patch of drifting kelp. ‘‘No examples were 
noticed in November.’’ This species ‘‘was more sparingly represented than its 
congener mazima.’’ It is known that Mr. Loomis took a number of specimens. 
but these were all destroyed in the San Francisco fire of 1906. 
Dr. Louis B. Bishop records (Condor, vu, September, 1905, p. 141) the 
capture of ‘‘an adult male’’ Elegant Tern at Pacific Beach, near San Diego, 
September 21, 1904. 
In 1910, Mr. Rollo H. Beck wrote (Proc. Calif. Acad. Sci.. 4th ser., 1, 
September 17, 1910, p. 64) that in his extensive collecting for the California 
Academy of Sciences on Monterey Bay at various times between September 
8, 1903, and January 22, 1910, he had never himself met with the Elegant Tern. 
On August 2, 1910, Mr. Beck began regular work with the water birds on 
Monterey Bay for the California Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, and continued 
thus until March 1, 1911. During this period he encountered the Elegant Tern 
once, on October 27, 1910, when one example, a male (now no. 18382, Mus. Vert. 
Zool.), was obtained. His field notes of that date indicate that four of the 
birds were seen by him late in the afternoon off China Point (Pacifie Grove), 
going south. The one shot had a fish in its stomach. The same four birds, pre- 
sumably, had been seen earlier in the day (about 2 p. m.) off Seaside. 
In the fall of 1918 collecting was done at Morro, San Luis Obispo County. 
