Fairy tern Fairy tern The fairy tern ("Sternula nereis") is a small tern which is native to the southwestern Pacific. It is listed as "Vulnerable" by the IUCN and the New Zealand subspecies is "Critically Endangered". There are three subspecies: The fairy tern is a small tern with a white body and light bluish-grey wings. The crown and nape is black. It can be distinguished from the little tern in that a black band extends no further than the eye and not as far as the bill. In the breeding plumage both the beak and the legs are yellowish-orange. During the rest
Sooty tern Sooty tern The sooty tern ("Onychoprion fuscatus") is a seabird in the family Laridae. It is a bird of the tropical oceans, breeding on islands throughout the equatorial zone. The sooty tern was described by Linnaeus in 1766 as "Sterna fuscata", bearing this name for many years until the genus "Sterna" was split up. It is now known as "Onychoprion fuscatus". The genus name is from Ancient Greek "onux", "claw", and "prion", "nail". The specific "fuscatus" is Latin for "dark". Colloquially, it is known as the wideawake tern or just wideawake. This refers to the incessant calls produced by a