Featured Image - Spring 2002

Forster's Tern in flight 

Spring ushers in a host of migrating shorebirds into Oklahoma. Among my favorites are the terns. The endangered Least Terns nest here in the state in several places. Forster's Terns only stop long enough to catch up on food and rest. A great place to see them is at Great Salt Plains NWR below the dam of the Salt Fork River. When feeding they fly along watching the water below them. When they see a small fish, they dive-bomb straight down, smacking the water as they hit.

Terns are beautiful, graceful fliers, and they lay their eggs in shallow nests along the shoreline. Predators such as coyotes and hawks take many of them, as well as humans not watching where they are walking along the beach. I love to photograph them in flight gliding along, hovering in the wind.   

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