ABSTRACT
The Sandwich tern breeds in the Bahamas and along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts (Virginia to Argentina); its breeding range in the Old World includes the Caspian Sea, Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea, British Isles, and coastal areas from northwestern Africa to southern Sweden. Sandwich terns winter from the Bahamas and Florida south to Argentina and on the Pacific Coast from Central America to Peru. In the Old World, Sandwich terns winter in southern India, western Africa, the Mediterranean area, and in parts of the Middle East. Aerial counts of nests and nesting birds have rarely been used for these terns, but aerial censuses seem promising because the conspicuous dense nesting colonies of these birds are usually located in areas with scant vegetation. One innovation used with colonial species of terns and similar birds is to construct a low fence (2.5-cm hexagonal mesh chicken wire) around several small areas of the nesting colony.
