Asked about this topic, I thumbed through the records available to me. They confirm that Peterjohn (2001) is on the money when he says Forster's terns "have returned by 25-26 March, and frequently appear during the first week of April." Over the past decade, for example, there are a dozen published records in the Ohio Cardinal on or before 12 April for the state (plus quite a few others in the background, since generally only the first spring record is published). There are two records for 25 March, in Muskingum (1999) and Allen (2002) counties. There are Lake Erie records before 10 April from Erie, Cuyahoga, Lorain, Lake, and Lucas counties. Greg Links reported one in Lucas County on 7 April 2001; on that same day, Forster's were also seen in Lake (J. Pogacnik), Wayne (S. Snyder), and Paulding (M&D Dunakin) counties. All of this is reflected in the "OBRC Checklist of the Birds of Ohio," available as the annotated version of the state list at http://www.ohiobirds.org/publications/checklist/checklists.php . A new edition of this list is in preparation for later this year; it will be in a larger format, incorporating extra data and new accepted Ohio species, the most recent of which is a white-throated swift Aeronautes saxatalis documented in Lucas County 2 April 2006. One last note, speaking of first arrivals. By 15 April last year (just the day after tomorrow) we had Ohio reports of 18 warbler species! They'll be here eventually... Cheers to all, Bill Whan Columbus ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]