Graceful and buoyant fliers, adults are light gray-brown above with black caps, have dark flight feathers contrasting with grayer mantles and light underparts. Breeding adults have a central pair of tail feathers extremely long and pointed, extending up to eight inches past the rest of the tail.

They are not usually as aggressive as other jaegers and rely as much on food they pick from the ocean's surface as they do from food they steal from other small seabirds.

The Long-tailed jaeger is a rare to fairly common fall transient offshore. They are usually detected when Arctic terns and Sabine's gulls are in high numbers.

Hear the call of the Long-tailed jaeger

Photo by ©Greg Gilson