Thalasseus sandvicensis
Silhouette: JJ Harrison (vectorized by T. Michael Keesey) · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~40% in a week ~70%
The Sandwich tern (Thalasseus sandvicensis) is a tern in the family Laridae. It is very closely related to the lesser crested tern (T. bengalensis), Chinese crested tern (T. bernsteini), Cabot's tern (T. acuflavidus), and elegant tern (T. elegans) and has been known to interbreed with both elegant and lesser crested terns. It breeds in the Palearctic from Europe to the Caspian Sea, and winters in the Mediterranean and on the coasts of Africa, India, and Sri Lanka.
The Sandwich tern is a medium-large tern with pale silvery-grey upperparts, white underparts, a yellow-tipped black bill, and a shaggy black crest which becomes less extensive in winter with a white crown. Young birds bear grey and blackish scalloped plumage on their backs and wings. It is a vocal bird. It nests in a ground scrape and lays one to three eggs.
Like all Thalasseus terns, the Sandwich tern feeds by plunge-diving for fish, usually in marine environments, and the offering of fish by the male to the female is part of the courtship display. The terns are small to medium-sized seabirds, gull-like in appearance, but usually with a more delicate, lighter build and shorter, weaker legs. They have long,... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dakar | 🇸🇳 Senegal | |
| 2 | Algiers | 🇩🇿 Algeria | |
| 3 | Rabat | 🇲🇦 Morocco | |
| 4 | Havana | 🇨🇺 Cuba | |
| 5 | Vitória | 🇧🇷 Brazil | |
| 6 | Kuwait City | 🇰🇼 Kuwait | |
| 7 | Casablanca | 🇲🇦 Morocco | |
| 8 | Liverpool | 🇬🇧 United Kingdom | |
| 9 | Porto | 🇵🇹 Portugal | |
| 10 | Dublin | 🇮🇪 Ireland |
Possible
About 20% of wildlife watchers report a Sandwich Tern sighting in Rabat on a given day, based on 37 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 45th most-seen of the 100 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 40%, and over a week to about 70%, if each day is a fresh chance.
February and March
In those months about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Sandwich Tern in Rabat on a given day, against about 10% in January, April–June and August–November, the lowest months.
Between 9 am and noon
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Sandwich Tern sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
3rd of 50
Of the 50 cities where we can rate Sandwich Tern sightings, Rabat ranks 3rd at about 20%. The best odds are in Dakar (Senegal, about 50%) and Algiers (Algeria, about 20%).
Same family: Laridae
The closest relatives of the Sandwich Tern that you can see in Rabat (family Laridae, Gulls, Terns, and Skimmers) are Lesser Black-backed Gull (about 50%), Yellow-legged Gull (about 40%) and Black-headed Gull (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Sandwich Tern is recorded against all the birds logged in Rabat (37 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
