Black-bellied Tern

How to identify

Field marks

1. Crown and nape black, back pale gray in breeding plumage
2. Belly black in breeding plumage, fading toward breast
3. Tail deeply forked with pointed tips
4. Belly whitish and bill tip dark in the non-breeding season

Similar species

Whiskered Tern

In breeding plumage, Whiskered Tern has a shallowly forked tail and black closer to the breast; Black-bellied Tern has a deeply forked tail and black on the lower belly.

Where and when it's recorded

Busiest months: October · Most records: India, Nepal, Pakistan

Black-bellied Tern has been recorded at 38 of the 8,276 birding hotspots we track, in 5 countries and regions.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

To protect this bird from disturbance, we don't list exact sites.

Countries and regions with the most records

IndiaNepalPakistanBangladeshMyanmar (Burma)

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The black-bellied tern (Sterna acuticauda) is a tern found near large rivers in the Indian subcontinent, its range extending from Pakistan, Nepal and India to Myanmar. It has become very scarce in the eastern part of its range and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed its conservation status as being endangered.

Excerpt from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · authors · Read more on Wikipedia

Questions