#sooty tern

[vintagewildlife]

Sooty terns By: Tony Beamish From: The World Conservation Yearbook 1976

[scottpartridge]

Prompt 17 of #feathruary2025 is Aquatic and I'm posting a young #SootyTern being stalked by a #GiantTrevally

@feathruary is hosted by @projectparlor and @mischievousredfox

[ukelele-boy]

Vo and Expe

Art credit: @qing-yunhawk

[vintagewildlife]

Sooty terns By: Cameron B. Kepler From: The Fascinating Secrets of Oceans & Islands 1972

[supremebirdbracket]

Shorebirds Semifinals: Sooty tern vs Little auk

Sooty tern

Little auk

Voting ended onAug 25, 2023

A pair of well-dressed birdies!

Sooty terns reside throughout tropical oceans around the globe, breeding on islands near the equator. They lay a single egg in a shallow scrape of a nest on a rocky or coral island. They take fish from the surface of the water, typically targeting dense schools far out at sea. Sooty terns can spend a whopping 3 to 10 years on the wing at sea—they can’t even float, since they don’t have the appropriate oil in their feathers.

Little auks, or dovekies, live in the North Atlantic, breeding in the Arctic and wintering slightly further south. They forage underwater for crustaceans, primarily copepods, usually in the open ocean but closer to shore during nesting. They nest in large colonies on coastal cliffsides, laying a single egg in a rocky crevice.

[birds-that-screm]

Sooty Tern (Onychoprion fuscatus)

© David Irving

[that-bird-is-a-mood]

Sooty Tern (Onychoprion fuscatus)

© David Irving

[redrcs]

Hunting

(On my travels)

Sooty Tern hunting at low tide, Clareview