Arctic Tern

(Sterna paradisaea)

This bird may not look very spectacular but it is nothing short of amazing. It is an Arctic Tern. The crazy thing is I photographed it in Antarctica! That’s right, the Arctic Tern migrates from the northern polar regions all the way to the southern polar region and back again every year! It is undoubtedly one of the world’s greatest travelers.

This means the Arctic Tern live in perpetual summer, breeding in the arctic summer, and then flying south for the antarctic summer.

I’ve taken much more colorful photos of them in breeding plumage in the arctic. We spent hours watching Arctic Terns catching fish and feeding them to their young at a breeding colony near Churchill, Manitoba in northern Canada.

Photographed in non-breeding plumage. Paradise Bay, Brown Base, Antarctica.