The gull-billed tern is a tern in the family Laridae. It is widely distributed and breeds in scattered localities in Europe, Asia, northwest Africa, and the Americas. The Australian gull-billed tern was previously considered a subspecies.
Region
Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas
Typical Environment
Breeds locally around coastal lagoons, estuaries, saltpans, and inland lakes and marshes with open, sparsely vegetated shorelines. Winters along warm coasts, river deltas, and large inland wetlands. Regularly forages over adjacent agricultural fields, pastures, and dry flats, often far from open water. Colonies are typically on low islands, sand or shell bars, or exposed mudflats that offer wide visibility and few predators.
Altitude Range
Sea level to 1500 m
Climate Zone
Other
Ease of Keeping
Beginner friendly: 1/5
Unlike most terns, the gull-billed tern has a stout, gull-like bill and often hawks insects over fields and wetlands rather than plunge-diving for fish. It breeds in scattered colonies on sandy or shelly flats near coasts and inland lakes. Some authorities now split the Australian population as Gelochelidon macrotarsa, separate from the widespread Eurasian–African–American G. nilotica.
Eggs, Collection Museum Wiesbaden
Temperament
social and active
Flight Pattern
buoyant, strong flier with steady wingbeats; capable of brief hovering
Social Behavior
Nests colonially on open ground, often alongside other terns or shorebirds. Pairs are monogamous during the breeding season and defend a small territory around the nest scrape. Both sexes incubate and feed chicks, and adults may mob intruders near colonies.
Migratory Pattern
Seasonal migrant
Song Description
Calls are harsh, gull-like kek and kerr notes, often given in series during flight. At colonies it gives a range of chattering and scolding calls used in displays and alarm.
Plumage
Clean white underparts with pale grey upperwings and back; breeding adults have a solid black cap contrasting with a white neck and body. Non-breeding birds show a mottled cap with a dusky ear-spot and a whiter forehead. Wings are broad with little contrast and the tail is only shallowly forked.
Diet
Takes large flying insects such as dragonflies, beetles, and grasshoppers, often caught on the wing. Also captures small fish, crustaceans, amphibians, and small reptiles, and occasionally takes eggs or chicks of other birds. Forages by aerial hawking, picking from the surface, and brief ground sallies rather than plunge-diving.
Preferred Environment
Feeds over coastal flats, marsh edges, rice fields, plowed fields, pastures, and along shorelines of lakes and estuaries. Often hunts well inland over open country near breeding or roosting sites.
