|
<br />Harper, Woods, Woodward, Maj or, Blaine, Kingfisher, Logan, and Payne
<br />Counties (Boyd 1987, L. Hill personal communication).
<br />
<br />Along the Arkansas River in Oklahoma, the interior least tern breeds in
<br />Kay, Osage, Pawnee, Creek, Tulsa, Wagoner, Muskogee, and Sequoyah Counties
<br />(Hoffman 1986, L. Hill personal communication). In Arkansas, the breeding
<br />. range on the Arkansas River is above Little Rock (Smith and Shepherd 1985,
<br />Smith et al. 1987, K. Smith 1986).
<br />
<br />Along the Canadian River, interior least terns breed in Ellis, Roger
<br />Mills, Dewey, Cleveland, McClain, Haskell, and Sequoyah Counties, Oklahoma
<br />and in Hemphill, Roberts and Hutchinson Counties, Texas (McCament and
<br />Thompson 1985, 1987; U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, unpublished data).
<br />
<br />Mississinni and Qh!Q Rivers: On the Mississippi River, interior least
<br />terns occur almost entirely in the lower valley south of Cairo, Illinois
<br />to Vicksburg, Mississippi (Sidle et al. 1988) (Table 3). Surveys by the
<br />U. S. Army Corps of Engineers (Rumancik 1985, 1986, 1987, and 1988; M.
<br />Smith 1986) and Missouri Department of Conservation (J. Smith 1985, 1986,
<br />1987, and 1988, Smith and Renken 1990) indicate that about one-half of all
<br />interior least terns occur along 1100 km of the Lower Mississippi River.
<br />
<br />On the Ohio River system, the interior least tern occurs just above the
<br />confluence of the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers and at one artificial site on
<br />the Wabash River in Indiana.
<br />
<br />Red River Svstem: Interior least terns are known to occur on the
<br />Prairie Dog Town Fork of the Red River in the eastern Texas Panhandle and
<br />along the Texas/Oklahoma boundary as far east as Burkburnett, Texas
<br />(McCament and Thompson 1985, 1987) (Table 4).
<br />
<br />Rio Grande ~ Svstem: Interior least terns occur at three
<br />reservoirs along the Rio Grande River and along the Pecos River at the
<br />Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico (McCament and Thompson
<br />1985, 1987; Neck and Riskind 1981, Seibert 1951, Marlatt 1984, 1987)
<br />(Table 5).
<br />
<br />Winterinl!: AnM: The wintering area of interior least terns is
<br />unknown. However, least terns of unknown populations or subspecies are
<br />found during the winter along the Central American coast and the northern
<br />coast of South America from Venezuela to northeastern Brazil. Roger Boyd
<br />(personal communication 1986) reports that about 35 least terns have been
<br />recaptured in South America, mostly in Guyana. One interior least tern
<br />banded by Boyd, was captured in E1 Salvador two years later. Also, a
<br />banded California least tern was recaptured in Guatemala.
<br />
<br />5
<br />
|