IN PRAISE OF TERNS
Posted: 01.07.26 in Articles category
July is my best month for seeing unusual terns. When I check my records, I can see that I saw my first ever Bridled Tern in July 2013 and my first Sooty Tern in July 2020. July last year really came up trumps with my first Caspian Tern in the county on the 16th , followed two days later by a White-winged Black Tern. However, the thrill for me is not about seeing rarities. Terns are beautiful and amazing to watch. They look so elegant with their slender wings, forked tails and streamer feathers. And in flight they are buoyant and graceful … twisting, turning and dropping down to water to feed. Sea terns often hover before plunging into the sea to hunt small fish whereas freshwater ‘marsh terns’ like the White-winged Black Tern dip down to the water surface to hawk insects. Their ‘sea swallow’ moniker seems so apt.
Here in Northumberland, we have 5 species of breeding tern. All are sea terns – Common, Arctic, Sandwich, Little and the very rare Roseate Tern as the county boasts the only regular breeding colony in the UK. That species is arguably the prettiest of the quintet with a rosy flush on its breast, vivid white plumage and very long tail. Currently there are more than a hundred pairs of Roseate terns just offshore on Coquet Island near Amble, compared to only 24 pairs twenty years ago.
Yet my favourite is the Arctic Tern. It too is pretty with its blood-red bill, pale grey wings and white body if you see it up close. Yet be careful if you get too close because this bird can be fierce and prone to peck your head repeatedly, as many visitors to its breeding colony on the Farne Islands have encountered! The local ‘tern story’ in 2026 involves a male Arctic Tern which paired up with a vagrant female American Black Tern – back for her 7th consecutive summer on the mid-Northumberland coast. This year she laid 3 eggs and hatched one, but the chick didn’t survive more than couple of days – perhaps because it couldn’t digest a marine diet of local sand eels.
Thinking of America, I am reminded of my friend Kevin Burrell and his lovely book, Considering Sparrows, which I reviewed in April this year on the Even Sparrows website. His book has a chapter entitled ‘Tern Pursuits’ and he focuses on the Arctic Tern. During our visit in June 2025 to the Farne Islands Kevin had an extremely close encounter with an Arctic Tern which continually tried to peck our heads before eventually settling on Kevin’s telescope and posing for a photo! In that chapter Kevin writes about the Arctic Tern - the bird which lives more of its life in daylight than any other creature as it migrates each year from pole to pole in pursuit of 24/7 light. Kevin Burrell argues that this bird would make a fitting mascot for a globe-trotting missionary like Paul, “pressing on towards the goal” in pursuit of righteousness, honesty and the Gospel as the apostle described himself doing in Philippians chapter 3 verses 12 -14. If this bird made a New Year’s resolution, Kevin argues that the tern would seek to “do whatever it takes to live fully in the light”.