Determining the sex of a guinea fowl. Simple ways to distinguish where the male is and where the female is

To effectively keep and breed guinea fowl, it is necessary to regulate the optimal ratio of male and female individuals in the population. Chickens and young animals of this species of poultry (up to three months) have practically no pronounced secondary sexual characteristics. This fact greatly complicates organizational procedures for beginning breeders. However, by certain signs it is possible to determine the sex of birds.

Reason for popularity

Despite the fact that the homeland of guinea fowl is hot Africa, the domesticated bird adapts well to regions with harsh climatic conditions.

Fast weight gain, unpretentiousness to feed, excellent taste of meat, eggs, superior in nutritional value and content useful microelements chicken, made royal bird desired in the personal backyards and farms of Russian poultry farmers. However, for breeding it is necessary to be able to distinguish birds by gender.

External differences between males and females

To distinguish the gender of young and adult guinea fowl by appearance, you must have certain knowledge and experience. Visually, birds of different sexes differ little from each other. The guinea fowl is a medium-sized bird that has a beautiful uniform gray color and some decorations in the form of a fleshy growth on the back of the head and earrings at the bottom of the beak. It resembles chicken and turkey.

Experts suggest paying attention to the head of the object being studied. Earrings, beak and bone comb are examined and assessed:

1. The male's earrings are more massive, the edges have a turn-up. In females they are much smaller and neater.
2. Males can boast of a larger beak, at the base of which a growth can be found.
3. It is possible to determine the sex of the bird visually in the direction of the ridge. In males it is rolled back. In females it is directed strictly upward.
4. Males of the Volga White breed, which have cream-colored plumage, have a lighter color than hens.

Such identification is approximately 85-90% accurate. A growth on the beak is often found in guinea fowl, and the earrings of old females thicken and become coarser.

On a general walk, you can distinguish a hen from a rooster by its greater mass. They are larger than males and heavier on average by one-fifth of weight. By 3 months, young animals usually gain 1.3 kg of weight, adults - up to 2 kg, and females are 20% fleshier. Roosters walk with their heads and tails raised proudly, demonstrating their superiority, while hens walk modestly and bow their heads to the ground.

Voice differences

Guinea fowl are considered noisy birds. They conflict with their grazing neighbors (chickens, geese) and even among themselves. But even in a calm state, the birds constantly communicate. Males produce simple melodies filled with whistling and crackling trills. Their friends conduct a conversation, exchanging laconic two-syllable signals, vaguely reminiscent of croaking.

In order to determine sex, the method of separating individuals from the family is practiced. In this case, females produce their characteristic sound, but with greater frequency and anxiety. Males lose musical abilities and start screaming.

This method is fraught with extreme noise levels and stress for the bird.

Determination of sex based on primary characteristics

An almost one hundred percent probability of selection is guaranteed by the study of primary sexual characteristics. Poultry farmers are able to freely determine the sex of a day-old chick. The procedure is not too complicated, but requires certain skills in working with birds and basic anatomical knowledge. It is suitable for determining the sex of guinea fowl of any age:

1. The bird is picked up. To avoid causing stress, the guinea fowl must be caught carefully and as silently as possible. For better blood circulation and calming, make several stroking movements on the bird’s back.
2. The guinea fowl is carefully turned over for better visualization and access to the cloaca, and the tail is moved back.
3. Fingers are placed on both sides of the hole, which first moves apart, and compress the neck of the cloaca.

After these manipulations, the male develops a penis from the hole. The female, accordingly, has nothing.

How to distinguish a female parrot from a male different breeds- general recommendations for determining the sex of a bird, and why it is so important. It is quite difficult to keep even an ornamental bird in captivity - it is necessary to take into account the nuances of its psychology and instincts. In parrots, gender has a huge influence on the form of keeping - this is especially true for females. Having reached reproductive age, a female parrot begins to lay eggs, tries to fulfill her natural program of building a nest, and protects it from strangers. If you do not allow the bird to realize its instincts, it may become seriously ill and will not live long after that. Therefore, the main question of distinguishing a female parrot from a male one is before purchasing a bird, as well as considering its price. When kept alone, males are much more in demand, and therefore...

Table of differences between the female and the male by breed:

	Male	Female
Wavy (adults)	Wax - blue, purple. They chirp a lot and produce complex trills.	Ceremony - beige, orange, white, always - white circles around the nostrils. They tweet little and simply, their behavior is that they are trying to build a nest.
	Wide and flat head, narrow pelvis, wide circles around the eyes.	Drop-shaped head, narrow circles around the eyes, wide pelvis, small beak.
	Brighter coloring, large beak with a long end.	There are no red feathers in the wings. Smaller head and beak.
Lovebirds	Males are large, the beak is wide and long. The head is long, low sloping forehead.	Smaller in size, head with a high, prominent forehead, wide pelvis. Tendency to order, cleaning feathers.
	The eyes are black.	Eyes brown or light.
	The head is yellow. The tip of the tail is pointed.	The head is grey. The tail is like a spatula.
	Wide powerful beak.	Less powerful beak.

You can distinguish a boy from a girl in breeds such as cockatoos or macaws only by the shape of the head and beak; breeders also calculate the sex using a simple formula. In many cases it is very difficult to determine the difference, especially in at a young age, since males and females have practically no distinctive features. In this case, biologists rely only on behavior, for example, males tend to practice making babies on nearby objects, and the female likes to tidy up the cage and carry twigs. Keeping a female parrot is more difficult; it is best to immediately find a mate for her. The thing is that when the female begins to lay eggs, her behavior becomes unpredictable and, at times, overly aggressive. Therefore, it is better to let her realize her parental ambitions, especially if the breed is large. In addition, predominantly males have the ability to speak.

There is a lot to be said about choice. pet. Due to characteristic features man, he chooses a pet to his liking. Some people are more attached to “our furry brothers,” and some are inclined to purchase a budgie. The number of parrot lovers is growing every day. And this is not without reason. How can you not love a small, colorful and smart bird. But almost every owner budgerigar asks the question: “What is his gender?” In order to know how to distinguish a female from a male budgerigar, there are several proven methods.

Characteristic differences

When purchasing such a pet, most people have no idea what gender their feathered friend is. Basically, people who are not interested in this problem simply do not intend to breed these wonderful creatures in the future. Despite this, there are people who approach this issue more thoroughly. There are several reasons for careful selection:

desire to breed budgies;
desire to teach your wavy “friend” to speak.

It is worth noting that only males can talk. Females are needed only for procreation and good mood.

The most common way to distinguish the gender of wavy birds is considered to be plumage color. Males are characterized by rich and bright feather colors. Males are clearly not deprived of vocal abilities. They need all these qualities to attract attention from females. To distinguish the sex of a parrot, you just need to look at the wax, or more precisely, at its color. But this method cannot always accurately answer the question of the parrot’s gender. It is most relevant for adults. It is almost impossible to determine the sex of chicks using it.

How to find out the gender of a budgerigar by its cere?

Chicks that have reached the age of one month can independently get out of the nest. At this stage, the formation of the parrot is complete. The difference between chicks and adults is presence of wave-shaped patterns, coming from the cere. The eyes are completely black. There is also a dark spot in the beak area, which disappears several weeks after its appearance.

Very often, it is during this period that owners think about how to distinguish a female from a male. It is extremely difficult to answer this question precisely, because wax color males and females are similar to each other. Typically the color is a pinkish tint or dark purple. Moreover, budgerigar chicks are characterized by the characteristic of changing the color of their cere throughout the day, depending on their mood.

At 2 months, the chicks can already be tamed and they begin to adapt to the conditions in which they live. People who are serious about buying such a pet try to purchase a budgie during this period. This is due to the fact that at this stage of formation, it is possible to most accurately determine the sex of the parrot. Young females, as they grow older, develop white circles around nostrils. But males are not endowed with this feature.

At the age of three months, the little chicks begin to molt. Instead of a light fluff on the head, dense plumage of bright color appears. It is at this moment that sexual maturation of individuals occurs, accompanied by change in corneal color. Males are characterized by a bright blue color, while in females the cere acquires a beige tint.

With age, the color of the wax in both female budgerigars and males becomes more saturated. This phenomenon is due to changes in the hormonal system of parrots.

In addition to color changes, you can find out the sex of a parrot by touch. Typically, as females age, the part above the beak becomes rougher. Sometimes, in that place, females form a small growth, which, after the end of the nesting period, disappears on its own.

Genetic method of gender recognition

This method allows you to distinguish the sex of an individual immediately after the chicks hatch. The method is based on the study of properties characteristic of a particular sex of the bird. This method is considered the most effective because number of chromosomes in males and females, always different.

Other methods of determining gender

Several other types of sex determination of budgerigars are used in practice:

This method is most often used by people who purchase parrots for breeding. For this, a DNA test is done. This method makes it possible to determine the sex of birds even at an early stage of development. To carry it out, a feather from a chick is taken and research is carried out on it in a special laboratory. But this method is used extremely rarely, due to its high cost.
Observation from the outside. If you watch your parrots for a certain time, you can quickly recognize which of them is which gender. Males begin to behave more actively in front of females. In addition, there were cases when the male tried to imitate sexual intercourse with the female.
Another method of determining gender is visual inspection parrot's head. As a rule, females have a flat nape and a sharp forehead. Males have mostly head larger size than that of the female, with a flattened crown.
Well, perhaps the most reliable way is the ability to lay eggs. If the parrot laid eggs, then it is definitely a female.

To find out what sex an individual or pair of individuals is, the owner should simply watch them a little. The female makes quiet sounds, unlike the male, who will try to attract the opposite sex with his entire appearance.

Using the above methods, you can find out how to determine the sex of a parrot, and not doubt the authenticity of the sexual origin of your pet.

The sex of a guinea fowl is a little more difficult to determine than other bird species that are traditionally bred in private farmsteads and factories.

Unfortunately, these charming, easy-to-keep birds are not as widespread as chickens and geese (although the products obtained from them are much healthier, tastier, and their sale is more profitable). That is why novice poultry farmers are wary of breeding them or do not dare to have them at all. And in vain.

The greatest difficulty in breeding and forming a herd is that the male guinea fowl is very similar in appearance to the female. It should be noted that this problem is faced not only by beginning farmers, but even by experienced ones, because they do not know all the signs of difference, but there are, nevertheless, many of them and they are quite obvious.

It is possible to distinguish a female from a male guinea fowl even at the earliest stages, and we will describe in detail how this is done in this article.

Is it possible to distinguish the sex of guinea fowl

Males and females of guinea fowl are so similar that it is simply impossible to immediately determine exactly who is who for some breeds. These are not ordinary geese, turkeys or chickens. Take a look at a flock of royal birds calmly strolling around the courtyard, and it may seem to you that there are simply no gender differences. But this is only at first glance. Birds somehow know how to distinguish a female, how to distinguish a male, which means we can do it too.

The easiest way

You may not know the main differences, but you can distinguish between a male and a female simply by their size.

So, in order to establish in a herd whether there is a female or a male, who he is and who she is, and how not to confuse them, you can use the simplest feature, namely, they differ in size. Males are not only slightly smaller, but they move differently. And they behave more dynamically.

If the livestock contains adult individuals, then everything is simple - the largest and most plump ones are females. Sometimes the difference in some breeds between females and males can be more than 20 percent.

However, if you have a large young population in which all its members look exactly the same, you need to build on other criteria that make it possible to distinguish guinea fowl by sex with one hundred percent confidence and without errors. Let's look at the main ones.

Sex differences

Some poultry farmers are confident that until a bird is 3 months old, determining its sex is a futile exercise. However, this is not correct. Those who have been breeding this bird for a long time can accurately determine the sex of even newly hatched chicks. This is not difficult, you just need to carefully examine the external genitalia. This is the most accurate and reliable method of determining if all hatched chicks are equal in size and identical in color.

In males, the genitals are better developed and resemble a small tubercle. However, when inspecting it, you need to act slowly and very carefully, as the chicks can get scared and get stressed, which will subsequently negatively affect their development.

When examining, carefully hold the guinea fowl in your hands and stroke its back soothingly. Not only will the chick calm down, but this procedure will also help improve blood circulation. This method requires certain skills, but it is not difficult and even a poultry farmer with little experience will quickly master it and subsequently be able to easily install the floor.

Video "Sex Differences"

Guinea fowl how to distinguish where the female is where the male is in a guinea fowl, who is he and who is she.

Sex differences in young animals

It is generally accepted that it is possible to distinguish the sex of guinea fowls only when they reach three months of age; until then, there are no differences. Exceptions include certain species of this bird. For example, Volga cream and white guinea fowl, their male plumage is lighter.

And yet, experienced poultry farmers who have been breeding the royal bird for many years can distinguish the sex of even day-old chicks. The main features are the external genitalia, since the color of the chicks in both females and males is almost identical.

The differences are as follows:

in males, the genital organ looks like a small tubercle, which, even at this age, is already well developed;
in females there are no outgrowths of any kind.

You need to act according to the following scheme. The chick is very carefully and carefully taken into one and stroked on the back with the other, then the tail is moved aside and the cloaca opens. IN at the moment blood flows into the tail part, as a result, the tubercle of the genital organ begins to fill with blood and this forces it to stick forward a little. If you have a female guinea fowl in your hands, the tubercle will not appear.

Such a procedure may seem complicated at first glance, but in practice it is not difficult to master even from the first examination. The main thing is not to scare the guinea fowl, since almost all breeds of this bird are very shy.

When trying to determine the sex, catch and handle them with extreme care, while keeping the room quiet.

More differences

It is not difficult to distinguish a male from a female guinea fowl; the main thing is to know the main signs, which include the structure of their head, appearance, behavior, and voice. If we talk about adult birds, then in males:

the beak is significantly larger than that of females;
earrings are thicker and meatier;
there is a beard;
the comb on the head is slightly larger and curved back;
during movement, the head is slightly tilted forward, which they try to raise higher, showing others their own superiority;
the tail is bent upward;
males scream intermittently, with a specific crackling sound.

The characteristics of females are as follows:

large sizes;
the gait is timid, the head and tail are lowered;
the head and beak are small;
no beard;
small earrings;
the scallop is small and in a vertical position;
Her voice is relatively quiet, without crackles, a little like “ooh” and is very different from the voice of males.

This video shows how to correctly and accurately determine the sex of guinea fowl.

Angelfish are the most popular aquarium representatives of the cichlid family. Their lack of bright natural coloring is compensated by the beauty of their long fins and unusual body shape. Angelfish floating in the water seem to float in weightlessness, and their long wing fins support them. With their sophisticated appearance, these “angel fish,” as they are nicknamed abroad, make a stunning impression.

Angelfish have a peaceful nature, making them compatible with many other types of non-aggressive fish. It is not surprising that they have gained popularity among many aquarium hobbyists.

What do angelfish look like and where do they live?

IN natural environment angelfish live V South America, in the Amazon and Orinoco basins. At the same time, they prefer calm bodies of water with dense vegetation and slowly flowing water.

Representatives of the angelfish genus are united by similarities in body structure. They have a rounded body shape, reminiscent of a disk, the body is laterally compressed. This shape makes it easy to maneuver among dense thickets. That's enough large fish: body length is about 15 cm, and height is about 25 cm.

The dorsal and anal fins are elongated, and the pelvic fins resemble threads. The body of the angelfish is greater in height than in length, and thanks to its long fins, its outline resembles a crescent.

The natural color of the angelfish is not very bright: it is mainly silver and olive shades, with black transverse stripes. However, as a result of selection, many angelfish were bred a wide variety of colors. Among them: marble, black, zebra, pearl, leopard and others. A fish with even longer fins was also obtained - the veiled angelfish.

Breeding angelfish

Obtaining offspring from angelfish at home is a process that requires certain knowledge and preparation. These fish are not known for showing great concern for their offspring; sometimes they are prone to eating their eggs.

Before breeding mature fish fed with live food. For spawning you need to create the appropriate conditions:

the temperature in the aquarium is higher than usual - about 28 °C;
live food;
fresh water in the aquarium;
presence of males and females

During spawning, the female can lay 300-700 eggs. Angelfish eggs are laid on plant leaves or other objects in the aquarium. After 3 days the fry will appear. And in about a week, small angelfish will learn to swim.

How to distinguish a male from a female

Those who plan to breed these wonderful fish in home aquarium, sooner or later they are faced with the question: how to determine who is male and who is female?

It is sometimes difficult even for an experienced aquarist to distinguish a male from a female angelfish. The fact is that these fish gender differences are not clearly expressed, and in young fish they are almost absent. If you still need to find out the gender of the angelfish when purchasing, you should focus on the size: the most large fry are more likely to be males, and the smallest are more likely to be females.

Determining the sex of angelfish requires experience and practice. Therefore, beginners may have difficulties. Only by carefully observing your pets, comparing them and noting features of appearance and behavior, can you learn to distinguish females from males.

External gender differences

Angelfish are long-lived aquarium fish: their life expectancy reaches 10 years, sometimes more. In this case, they reach sexual maturity at the age of 7-12 months. Before this time, it is almost impossible to recognize females and males.

When determining the sex of adult angelfish, you need point out the main differences in appearance male and female:

Many experienced aquarists tend to consider the last difference to be perhaps the most reliable.

For beginners Another way might help. Among the fish, you need to select an individual in which the signs of sexual dimorphism are most clearly expressed, and use it as a guide when determining the sex of other angelfish.

If you have a goal to start breeding these fish yourself, but have difficulties determining their gender, the best option would be to buy an already formed pair. It’s good if this couple has already given birth to offspring.

Differences in behavior between the sexes

Some aquarists prefer to determine the sex of angelfish based on the behavior of the fish.

During the breeding season, angelfish, which usually lead a gregarious lifestyle, choose a partner and create pairs. It is not difficult even for a beginner to identify an established pair: it stays apart from the pack and looks for a suitable place for laying eggs.

At the same time, males behave as boys should, and females behave as girls should. This is especially noticeable if you observe their behavior within a couple. The males chase the females and drive them into the corners of the aquarium.

However, there are cases when two females unite in a pair. In this case, one of them, and sometimes both in turn, plays the role of “male”. You can only guess about this when both fish lay eggs - in this case, they will remain unfertilized.

By nature Angelfish are monogamous. The loss of a partner due to his death or separation from him is a strong stress for fish, which they may not survive. Angelfish can be injured by the walls of the aquarium and other objects and die. Therefore, you can try to select a pair for pets, but it is extremely undesirable to destroy already established pairs.