such as the dark outer webx 01 the outer teil leathers in the 
which nicy or me y not be an important character. As you know 
about nil there is jus. which one can use in the genus Sterna l 
aault 
t ha t s 
i have sev o. up the Roseate tern until now so that i may spring, 
on you the ft ct that judging from behaviour alone he seems to be almost 
a Sandwich tern. The norm 1 aggressive call is the gek- ering (almost 
indistinguishable from the Sandwich* s) ana the slight crest (he has 
rather more of one -he the Arctic & common) ic raised as are ; 11 the 
leathers of neck and, back just as in the S; nawich. fnere is clearly 
a fish call which doesn't seem to be used in fights but which is us ©a 
to maintain contact .between the pair. The io a begging ooflcnsists of 
individual syllables. ,»i ,h reg&ra to the density oi nesting i cannot 
decide from my own observe,'- ions as the Rose? tes hav. formed 
themselves into t colony or ' their own on the Tarn.-, s. bn the other htnu 
the harpies say that in ... re they tenu. to neot x®. more dei ly than 
Arctic ar.d Common. Kxxxxax Uni ortuna tely Vous , who has looked at 
colonic , oi Roseate, &juq. to . ..on n — wting seper-- telj m t tie ru - cli Ant rxr.es j 
says that the/ hose/ tes are no denser than the Common. io le&srn to my 
own observi t/lons some aspects oi the bene vi our etc seem to b« "cryptic" 
whil ,, others are// '’colonial 1 ' • There se-mo < tendency to re st in the 
middle of sf tucsok, c uite uni i ce ths other spp - 
The young ,/dsua lly (?) leave the nest to a-fa eca te. 
the adults fxfbrn direct observation but presumably 
is not the r ihg of drop in* s rounc the nest even bar ore the young 
which is so typic; 1 of Sandwich terns. noth eg 
much quo? nep than . a ndwich terns and to my eye ere 
The 9 oloniaj i-1 ike or non-crypt ic feta ures are (X) 
eg<« ,Ihells pna ( 2 ) lea a in, the young irom the nest 
^ 7 / 
any oi them l 
I don't know about 
they do also for there 
hat ch 
end young are 
more cryptic, 
not carrying away 
soon after hatching. 
^y r ca.se for arguin,. tha; t these two characters ere non-crypt ic is of 
course not • v-ry strong one ana re-ts entirely on the eviae ce from 
the Sandwich tern rher- the so features seem airectly concerned with 
the dense nesting. it is i suppe i ole that th lack of eg^ shell 
removal 1 might have . entirely different expl? iu tion. Tor ex: i; h tha t 
since thw /.use ne ats < re so ox ten in tussocks tuis e^ shwlxs an © 
jajsx not conspicuous to predatois. Rov ever the exiotenceoi the other 
behaviour similerit ie- between Roseate ano da ndwich sug est — no more — 
tha t it may be more closely rela tea to the Sandwich than the Arctic ana 
Com on. 
i h vs just thought of two more resemblance oe tween Roseate ana 
Sandwich which i didn't list beiore. Both seem to lack the ma inta ineu 
tilting oi the kxaicbcx black cap away from the female v.hich is so typical 
oi Arctic and Common. The Sandwich ha s in txiese situ** t ions a rhythmic 
rotory movement of the head which presum? bly has the same function, 
l con't see any sue/, movement in the Roseate out i may not have watch d 
enough as the movement seems uncommon in the Sandwich. The otx.er 
resemblance between Roseate ana 3 ndwich io their l&ck of predator 
defence. \Ao*l*±*p*^ 
tn flight 2 .re very reluctarxt to attack in the ay which is so 
familiar in Common and Arctic- 
