Scientific Name: Sternula albifrons

Diet: mainly marine fish

Habitat: The little tern nests on rocky shorelines, leaving its nesting site vulnerable to a number of predators and other dangers such as walkers and their dogs.

The Little Tern, 21–25 cm long with a 41–47 cm wingspan, breeds in colonies on gravel or shingle coasts and islands. It lays two to four eggs on the ground. Like all white terns, it is defensive of its nest and young and will attack intruders. Like most other white terns, the Little Tern feeds by plunge-diving for fish, usually from saline environments. The offering of fish by the male to the female is part of the courtship display.

At the beginning of the 19th century the Little Tern was a common bird of European shores, rivers and wetlands, but in the 20th century populations of coastal areas decreased because of habitat loss, pollution and human disturbance. The Little Tern population has declined or become extinct in many European countries, but recent conservation efforts by organisations such as the Louth Nature Trust in Ireland have helped slow it’s decline on our shores.