Question for All You Lovie experts!

[Mary in Florida]

Someone who raises lovebirds along with other birds told us that one can tell that a lovebird is a female at a young age, because a female will begin to tear paper and tuck it into her feathers, and a male lovebird will not do that. Wondering what you guys think of this method to determine the sex of lovebirds, and is there any truth to this?

We've had Loki, our new whiteface cobalt blue lovie for about 4 weeks now, so he's maybe 13-14 weeks old now. We've been calling Loki a "he" just as a default, I guess, because we don't know his sex and we had "feeling" (can't say why) he might be male. He's doing very well, eating well, socializing well, lively and funny as can be. He chatters almost all the time, with such a variety of chirps, whistles, calls, growls- he imitates the chatter of the parrotlet and our cockatiel's calls as well. He's started tearing paper, and a couple days ago he started tucking those papers into his feathers, mostly on his back but anywhere he can, it seems. That's what I recall our Sweetpea did as a youngster, only she followed our cockatiels around, took the paper "spitballs" ( we called them) they dropped and tucked those into her feathers before she started tearing her own paper.
We hadn't heard this tale about the paper strip tucking being characteristic of a female so it wasn't till Sweetpea laid her first egg that we figured she was a female for sure.

So if Loki's tucking paper into his feathers does this mean he's a she? We don't plan to have him sexed via DNA as it really doesn't matter to us which sex he is, and we don't plan to breed him.

Thanks in advance for shedding some light on this..

[linda040899]

I disagree that paper shredding and tucking indicates female because it isn't accurate all the time. I have a known male named Ezio (DNA sexed) and he can shred with the best of females! Paper is not safe around him! He's not as good at tucking it in his rump feathering (only Peachfaces do this.) as a female, but he can get some to stick there. I also have a known hen that does the swishy swishy so that's not even accurate. :)

Leave to a lovebird and they will surprise you every time, with the exception of finding an egg. That ALWAYS indicates hen! :D

[Mary in Florida]

I'm not surprised to hear that, I figured that paper tucking, ( or swishy-swishy for that matter) wasn't a sure-fire way to tell a bird's sex- otherwise, people would look for that behavior instead of going through the expense of DNA testing LOL, guess we'll keep on calling Loki a "he" till (if) he lays his first egg!

He's ornery like a female, that's for sure, or maybe just like young lovebird. Cute as a button, and he is sweet, too....