Sengal Parrot Yellow Tail Coloring

[MandyG]

Wow Kathleen, that's really interesting!

[pfinarffle]

Looks like PeeWee is also a male (DNA tested)! This is consistent with the theory that if your bird has yellow tail feathers it's a boy.

[pchela]

It's a boy! Congratulations! I assume you just found out?

Pippin will not let me touch his tail so I cannot spread the feathers out to where the yellow feather can be seen, let alone get a photo. I'll keep trying though. Now I'm curious if any others on here have males with a bit of yellow in their tails.

Edit- Just found this site. http://www.wingscc.com/aps/apsmail/senegal_sexing.aspx Looks like when they talk about the males having yellow tail feathers they are talking bout the feathers under the main tail feathers. Have you heard that the yellow can also occur in the main tail feathers in males?

[pfinarffle]

Yes, I'd seen that site before, and PeeWee's undertail feathers are all yellow save for some green streaking away from his legs. But I'd never heard that s sometimes had yellow on their actual tail feathers let alone on the tops of said tail feathers as seen in the photo I took recently. The yellow feather almost looks like that "pied" Sennie photo someone else recently posted a topic about, except the pied coloration is strictly limited to the tail. Anyway, it's always just one feather, the rightmost one. And yes, we just found out he's a HeWee yesterday. So yes, if anyone else sees yellow on their birds tail feathers (not undertail feathers), I'd love to hear it as I think it's possibly a male thing.

[SirHubi]

My Cookie has a orange feather on tail like PeeWee, however it was not DNA sexed. Cookie has a flat head, but a long V on its chest. Cookie's flat head would suggest it is a boy, but long V would suggest it is a girl. Yellow feather on tail looks like a male thing from what you found out so far, but I'm not sure. We need more evidence to establish that a yellow feather is a male thing.

[pfinarffle]

My Cookie has a orange feather on tail like PeeWee, however it was not DNA sexed. Cookie has a flat head, but a long V on its chest. Cookie's flat head would suggest it is a boy, but long V would suggest it is a girl. Yellow feather on tail looks like a male thing from what you found out so far, but I'm not sure. We need more evidence to establish that a yellow feather is a male thing.

PeeWee also has a flat head and a longer V than I think most males should have. I've heard of two other s with yellow tail feathers, and thus far they're both boys. Interestingly enough, the feathers tend not to be permanent. The one story of a yellow tail feather I heard about from another online group is a yellow tail feather that cropped up after a bird was re-homed, which is in essence what happened with our bird. Perhaps it's not just a male thing, but a male stress-reaction thing?

[MissLady9902]

Noodle has a partially yellow feather but it's underneath one of her tail feathers and she's a DNA sexed female.

[Michael]

It looks like the yellow tail spots are like a sort of birth mark. Like a bit of an impurity that lets the yellow show through the green maybe?

[pfinarffle]

It looks like the yellow tail spots are like a sort of birth mark. Like a bit of an impurity that lets the yellow show through the green maybe?

The feathers do almost look just like that "pied" Senegal variation we saw posted here a bit ago.

One person told me that they'd noticed yellow growing in where previous green feathers had been damaged before, like from an accidental pulling out, injury or even purposeful plucking. But even in these instances it's only temporary... I also wonder if it doesn't have to do with mating season somehow since I guess we're getting there with the spring.

[pchela]

The theory that the different color comes in after a feather has been damaged is a good one. My Meyers who plucks her tail and back feathers used to have a brilliant blue color on her rump. Those feathers now come in yellow with a blue one popping up now and then though the blue is the greenish blue that matches her chest and not the brilliant blue that she used to have on her backside. I don't know why that would be but it does fit with the theory.