Thalasseus sandvicensis
Silhouette: JJ Harrison (vectorized by T. Michael Keesey) · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~20%
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 |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Sandwich Tern sighting in Garden Route National Park on a given day, based on 51 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 147th most-seen of the 222 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 20%, if each day is a fresh chance.
March and December–January
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Sandwich Tern in Garden Route National Park on a given day, against under 5% in February and April–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.
23rd of 43
Of the 43 parks where we can rate Sandwich Tern sightings, Garden Route National Park ranks 23rd at under 5%. The best odds are in Ría Lagartos Biosphere Reserve (Mexico, about 60%), West Coast National Park (South Africa, about 40%) and Celestún Biosphere Reserve (Mexico, about 40%). All parks ranked.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Sandwich Tern is recorded against all the birds logged in Garden Route National Park (51 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), 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.
