* Roseate Tern  Sterna dougallii

Texas Status: Accidental. Texas has two documented records, both adults. One record is from the coast 10 April 1901 in Corpus Christi.

Gulf of Mexico Status: The closest breeding colonies to Texas are found in the Florida Keys, where they are uncommon summer residents from April to August. (eBird)

Habitat: Coastal and Offshore Pelagic. 

Similar Species: Separating Roseate Terns from Forster’s Tern (S. forsteri) and Common Tern (S. hirundo) is an identification challenge that has made documenting this species difficult.

Never Seen on Texas Pelagic trip. Accidental in Texas.
* Texas Review Species, requiring written or photographic documentation to TBRC.
(1) TOS Handbook of Texas Birds; by Mark W. Lockwood and Brush Freeman (2005)

Seasonal Occurrence Graph

Texas Pelagics Sightings Distribution 

Map 1) The live Google map above shows the geographic distribution of Roseate Tern found in Offshore Texas from lat-long data I’ve captured from 35 years of Texas Pelagics. 
Click on the box in the upper left of the map to view the map legend.
Click on each sighting symbol and the data label will appear showing the time, date and the number of birds seen.
Click on the symbol on the top right of the map to view a larger map.

The next two map images are copied from eBird.

Map 2) The map below is zoomed into Texas and Louisiana to show individual locations.

Map 3) The bottom map is zoomed out to show the GOM, the northern Caribbean Sea and the adjacent western tropical Atlantic ocean. 

© Copyright 1998-2022 Garett Hodne. All materials on all sites within this domain are copyrighted by Garett Hodne. Some individual items may be copyrighted by the author, photographer, or other sources as noted. All rights are reserved. All material is available for personal and private use only. However all material herein may not be reprinted, re-distributed, copied to other websites or reproduced for public use in any way without the express advanced written permission of the webmaster.