Gould thought that this tern was appropriately called paradisea because of its elegant form and beautiful colouring. It was named 'roseate' because of the pink flush on its breast but this was only seen during the breeding season.

The Roseate Tern, although nowhere very numerous, had a wide range but Gould believed it was becoming scarce in Britain. He wrote 'Formerly there was scarcely a large sand-spit or rock promontory in the British Islands...that had not its little colony of Roseate Terns...Now it is to be feared that they have either been killed off from many of these favourite localities, or they have deserted them.'

DISTRIBUTION: Nearly cosmopolitan. Locally in west and northern Europe, east Atlantic islands, east and south Africa, south Asia and the Philippines, and locally in east North America and West Indies and islands off northern Honduras. Winters mostly at sea. In Britain population reduced to between 300-350 pairs