Acknowledgments

Our studies of Royal Tern biology (including writing of this account) have been funded by the Mae P. Smith Fund of the American Museum of Natural History, several National Science Foundation grants, and by U.S. National Park Service, U.S. Geological Survey–Patuxent Wildlife Research Center, and Virginia Academy of Sciences, with support from Old Dominion and Hofstra Universities, and the following land-management entities: Antilles International Salt Co.; U.S. National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S. Navy; superintendents at Cape Hatteras and Cape Lookout National Seashores, especially Bob Barbee and the late Mack Riddel; refuge managers at Fisherman’s I. National Wildlife Refuge, especially Bob Gilmore and Paul Daly; and Bob Linn, U.S. National Park Service.

For field assistance, we gratefully acknowledge Bob Anderson, Dennis Burke, Mitchell Byrd, Julie Siegel, Grace Tilger, John Weske, and Tim and Debbie Zorach. For advice and information of various sorts, we thank Arnoud van den Berg, Mitchell Byrd, Dick Cannings, Roger Clapp, Charlie Collins, Alan Contreras, Euan Dunn, Mike Erwin, Dick Estes, Kimball Garrett, Lynda Garrett, Jon Greenlaw, Jack Hailman, Ruud van Halewyn, Kathy Klimkiewicz, Paul Lehman, Rob Norton, Jim Parnell, Michael Patten, Rich Paul, E. C. Pielou, Jim Rohlf, Fred Schaffner, Dave Shealer, Jan Veen, and Ed Willis. R. Loftin, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission provided unpublished distribution information from the Florida Breeding Bird Atlas. We are particularly grateful for counsel, suggestions, and friendship of several colleagues no longer with us: Oliver Austin, Mike Cullen, Gene Eisenmann, Rodolfo Escalante, Bill Hamilton, René de Naurois, Bill Robertson, Helmut Sick, Jan van Iersel, and Karel Voous. We miss each one of them keenly. Finally, we acknowledge exceedingly helpful comments on this manuscript from Alan Poole, Keith Russell, Don Kroodsma, Louis Bevier, and, especially, Steve Emslie.