ML30521211

Age and sex

Adult, Unknown sex - X

Observation details

Tom Ford-Hutchinson found a black-backed tern flying above the tern colony in the late afternoon. He presumed this bird to be the returning Sooty Tern from years past. Myself, Tom Benson, Curtis Marantz, Mike Huang, and Tom FH walked up PCH to get a better look at the bird. Once we positioned ourselves across from the tern colony we immediately noticed this bird was in fact a Bridled Tern due to the grey back with contrasting black wing tips, long white supercillium extending past the eye, longer tail projecting past the primaries, and white collar separating the black cap from the dusky grey back. We then documented the bird to the best of our abilities and proceeded to contact everyone we could think of (minus my phone as the battery ran out). Spectacled Tern would have a much paler back than this bird showed. The bird seemed to favor flying around the northwest side of the tern colony and would hover just a couple of feet over the colony. It also seemed to favor resting on the south side of the colony, which made it easy to view from along PCH. This bird represents the 4th record for California and the second record for Orange County.

Technical information

Model

Canon EOS 5D Mark III

Lens

EF400mm f/5.6L USM

ISO

500

Focal length

560 mm

Flash

Flash did not fire, auto

f-stop

f/8.0

Shutter speed

1/1600 sec

Dimensions

1309 pixels x 873 pixels

Original file size

416.69 KB