Why kids – Fun and facts about animals and history

Royal tern – (BIRD-gull_tern) See facts

Name of animal-plant: Royal tern

Species name: Thalasseus maximus

This bird has two distinctive subspecies: T. m. maximus which lives on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the North and South America, and the slightly smaller T. m. albididorsalis lives on the coast of West Africa. The royal tern has a red-orange bill and a black cap during the breeding season, but in the winter the cap becomes patchy. The royal tern is found in Europe, Africa, the Americas, and the Caribbean islands. The royal tern lives on the coast and is only found near salt water. They tend to feed near the shore, close to the beach or in backwater bays. The royal tern’s conservation status is listed as least concern.

Animal type: BIRD

Birds (Aves) are a group of endothermic vertebrates, characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a lightweight but strong skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the 5 cm (2 in) bee hummingbird to the 2.75 m (9 ft) ostrich. They rank as the class of tetrapods with the most living species, at approximately ten thousand, with more than half of these being passerines, sometimes known as perching birds or, less accurately, as songbirds.

Subcategory: gull_tern

 

Fact:

All animals and plants are given a species name based on a technical term in biological taxnomy. The species name consists of two words and is based on Latin.

The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs and  the second part identifies the species within the genus. In this animals case it is: Thalasseus maximus