GULLS AND TERNS: BLACK TERN 
295 
winters from Mazatlan, Mexico, along Pacific coast to Peru and Chile; in migration 
from Gulf of Mexico to northern South America along Atlantic coast. 
State Records. —The Black Tern is so abundant in the San Luis Valley of 
Colorado that it must necessarily be more common in New Mexico than the few 
records of its occurrence in that State would indicate. It will undoubtedly be found 
to breed around the lakes of northern New Mexico, but at the present time is known 
only as a spring and fall migrant. It was fairly common at Lake Burford, August 
11, 1913, but the young were then full grown and there was nothing to prove that 
they had been hatched in the immediate neighborhood (Ligon). Two were taken 
August 28-29, 1903, at Loveless Lake (Gaut); two noted at Beaver Lake, 7,500 feet, 
August 26, 1908, and several seen August 31,1903, over a pond near Las Vegas (Bai¬ 
ley); also a few noted September, 1854, on the Rio Grande near Fort Thorn (Henry). 
[One was seen June 1, 1924, at lakes about two miles east of Dexter (Ligon). 
Three were seen in spring at Lake Burford June 6, 1918 (Wetmore). A flock of 
about 200 were seen on the Rio Mimbres 30 miles southeast of Silver City May 25, 
1919 (Kellogg). At the lake of the Rio Grande Auto and Gun Club, June 16, 1919, 
12 were seen (Ligon) ].—W. W. Cooke. 
Nest. —Usually in colonies, generally on floating rushes in shallow water of 
grassy slough or partly open marsh, sometimes on drift, an old muskrat house, or 
even the bare ground, made of cat-tails, rcedB, or grasses. Eggs: 2 to 3, olive-brown, 
rarely whitish, heavily spotted and blotched with chocolate or black, often confluent 
about the larger end. 
Food. —Instead of preying on food fishes, this Tern feeds extensively upon fish 
enemies, such as dragon fly nymphs, fish-eating beetles, and crawfishes. It also 
devours a great variety of insects, such as dragon flies, May flics, grasshoppers, 
locusts, predacious diving beetles, scarabaeid beetles, leaf beetles, click beetles, 
weevils, the moths of the cotton boll worm and fall army worm, gnats, and other 
flies, grubs and worms, so that it takes its place among the birds of decided economic 
value. 
General Habits. —So closely are the white terns associated with 
lake shores and sea coasts that the sight of this black-fronted Tern 
skimming swallow-like low over the ground far from water, or a flock 
following a gang plow, perhaps associated with Brewer Blackbirds, 
Grackles, and Franklin Gulls, startles by its apparent incongruity; but 
as the food list suggests, this strikingly marked water swallow— 
Hydrochelidon by one of its old names—spends a great deal of its 
time flying over prairie and plains, not too far from its marshy nesting 
ground, catching insects on the wing or in the grass to carry back to 
its young securely hidden among the tules. When they are fledged, 
a noisy brood may be seen occupying a row of roadside fence posts, 
their white heads showing dusky ear marks, while their parents with 
white spots already appearing in their black hoods fly slowly by, 
skillfully feeding the clamorous brood as they pass. 
An experience in photographing Tern families in a small Saskatche¬ 
wan colony, with nests in three feet of water, is interestingly described 
by Mr. H. H. Pittman in the Condor. The deep water chosen by the 
colony he assumes to be “to discourage wolves and other enemies.” 
It might well have discouraged a photographer, but an old two-wheeled 
