Roseate tern

Weight

112 g – 117 g

Length

Not recorded

Lifespan

23.8 years – 25.7 years

Diet

Aquatic predator

Main food

Not recorded

Habitat

marine

Egg incubation

23 days

Young per litter or clutch

1.66

Age at maturity

2.49 years – 3 years

Litters or clutches a year

1

Lifestyle

Aerial

Migration

Migratory

Conservation status

Not recorded

Countries on record

1 countrysrc for Countries on record

The roseate tern is listed for 1 country.

The same countries as a list

1. Australia

No conservation assessment is recorded for this species in our sources. That is not the same as being safe: it has not been matched to an assessment.

1. kingdomAnimalia
2. phylumChordata
3. classAves
4. orderCharadriiformes
5. familyLaridae
6. genusSterna
7. SpeciesSterna dougallii Montagu, 1813

Synonyms Sterna rosea, Teretistris elegans

Catalogue of Life

LC, Least Concern

Common tern

Sterna hirundo

Laridae

LC, Least Concern

Arctic tern

Sterna paradisaea

Laridae

R

River tern

Sterna aurantia

LaridaeNo free photo yet

B

Blac-naped tern

Sterna sumatrana

LaridaeNo free photo yet

W

Wreathed tern

Sterna vittata

LaridaeNo free photo yet

H

Havell's tern

Sterna forsteri

LaridaeNo free photo yet

CompareRoseate tern vs Common ternRoseate tern vs Arctic ternRoseate tern vs River ternRoseate tern vs Blac-naped tern

• An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles · CC0 1.0 · E096-269
  Myhrvold, N.P., Baldridge, E., Chan, B., Sivam, D., Freeman, D.L. & Ernest, S.K.M. (2015) An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96: 3109. https://doi.org/10.1890/15-0846R.1. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.3563457.v1
• AmphiBIO, a global database for amphibian ecological traits · CC BY 4.0 · v1
  Oliveira, B.F., São-Pedro, V.A., Santos-Barrera, G., Penone, C. & Costa, G.C. (2017) AmphiBIO, a global database for amphibian ecological traits. Scientific Data 4: 170123. https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2017.123. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.4644424.v5
• AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds · CC BY 4.0 · v7
  Tobias, J.A. et al. (2022) AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds. Ecology Letters 25: 581–597. https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.13898. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.16586228.v7
• Catalogue of Life eXtended Release · CC BY 4.0 · 2026-10-16 XR
  Catalogue of Life (2026). Catalogue of Life eXtended Release, version 2026-10-16 XR. Catalogue of Life Foundation, Amsterdam, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.48580/dgzlf
• Wikimedia Commons · per file (CC0 / public domain / CC BY green, CC BY-SA amber, anything else not displayed) · 2026-11-11
  Wikimedia Commons contributors. Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org (each file credited to its author under its own licence).
• EltonTraits 1.0: species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals · CC0 1.0 · 1.0
  Wilman, H., Belmaker, J., Simpson, J., de la Rosa, C., Rivadeneira, M.M. & Jetz, W. (2014) EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95: 2027. https://doi.org/10.1890/13-1917.1. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.3559887.v1
• Wikidata · CC0 1.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikidata contributors. Wikidata. https://www.wikidata.org (data retrieved via the Wikidata Query Service).
• Wikipedia (English) · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org (text under CC BY-SA 4.0; each block names its article and revision).

@misc{roseate_tern_2026,
  title = {Roseate tern (Sterna dougallii)},
  author = {{CreatureData}},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://creaturedata.com/animals/roseate-tern},
  note = {Data as of 2026-11-11}
}