Australian finches use curious technique to determine sex

[Meagan83]

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/2631 ... ermine-sex
So, has everyone else found this to be true when breeding different head colors together? I'm trying to decide if I should rematch 2 of my pairs...

[L in Ontario]

Let us know how it turns out for you.

[Meagan83]

Liz, how are yours set up? Mine have been in mixed head color pairs. Admittedly I have had all male offspring, but that's only out of 3 babies. Also, I heard some people say that they tend to just end up with more male offspring regardless...

[L in Ontario]

I have them all mixed and sometimes I get 50/50 and sometimes more males. I can't find a solution to get more females... yet.

[CandoAviary]

Meagan, This is why I had set up an aviary with a colony of 4 pair of red heads. I also had 4 pair of RH males with BH females.
Unfortunately the colony set up will not produce very accurate records as many clutches were abandoned or never even incubated.
But I do have more females in the red hed pairs than the mixed head pairs. But you must keep in mind that this is only one season with aroun 30 chicks. To get an acurate count you should base it on a couple of hundred chicks

[Meagan83]

I'm gonna try it. We'll see how it goes...