hellow! need some help!

[ronaldddd]

i have bought a cockatiel from a local store and i really want a male cockatiel becouse i hear only male cockatiels can talk and sing but the guy in the store could not tell or help me to know what the sex is so maybe someone can help me with it if it`s a male of female? please help! i made a video on youtube! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6EOkpM0GYs

[Wolf]

I couldn't tell if it was a female or a juvenile male, sorry.

[ronaldddd]

I couldn't tell if it was a female or a juvenile male, sorry.

Thank you for trying! although i heard that males make a kind of heart with there feathers is that true?

[Pajarita]

Wolf is correct, it's too young to tell and I've never heard about any heart in the feathers for visually sexing. Now, let me clarify something, cockatiels do not sing, they vocalize but there is no song to speak of unless you call their persistent two or three note call a song (which I would not). If you had your heart set on a male, why didn't you adopt an adult? Babies cannot be sexed.

[ronaldddd]

Wolf is correct, it's too young to tell and I've never heard about any heart in the feathers for visually sexing. Now, let me clarify something, cockatiels do not sing, they vocalize but there is no song to speak of unless you call their persistent two or three note call a song (which I would not). If you had your heart set on a male, why didn't you adopt an adult? Babies cannot be sexed.

Thank you for the comment! yea i was thinking about adopting an adult but everyone told me that having a baby cockatiel was better for bonding with the bird and having a better relationship!

[Wolf]

Not really true. They baby will bond right away most of the time, but in the birds mind you are now its parents and they look to you for everything as they don't know anything at all. Later on the baby bird goes through puberty and become an adult bird and is now capable of reproduction. The parental bonding now comes to an end as this is when they go looking for the mate that they will form a lifelong bond with, in most cases.
Now the bird will choose to bond with a new person or it will rebond with you. Usually the person whom they bond with after reaching maturity is not the same as the one they bonded with while a baby. This is one of the main reasons that there are so many birds in the rescues needing a home. It is also why the majority of people on this forum recommend that you adopt from a rescue instead of getting a baby bird.

[shiraartain]

Wolf is correct, it's too young to tell and I've never heard about any heart in the feathers for visually sexing. Now, let me clarify something, cockatiels do not sing, they vocalize but there is no song to speak of unless you call their persistent two or three note call a song (which I would not). If you had your heart set on a male, why didn't you adopt an adult? Babies cannot be sexed.

Regarding the heart in the feathers, male tiels form a heart-shape with their wings. Mine would do this whenever he whistled. I'll put up a YouTube video of him doing so once I get my laptop. Various behaviors and his clarity in talking helped me figure out his gender though. I don't believe it would be possible to know the gender for sure unless you had it DNA sexed. For example, I was very confused about my bird's gender since it wasn't losing his spots as males are supposed to do, but then it just turned out we had basically lucked out and gotten a male tiel whose coloration remained the same.

I'm sorry if this didn't make sense, just got home from a wedding. Will edit for clarity tomorrow when I link the video.

[Pajarita]

In wild phenotypes (the 'normal' coloration without any mutation present), the females would have a grey face without the yellow of the male and their orange patches are almost dull. In the whitefaces, same thing, grey face for the female with the faintest lighter patches (as if they had a bit of white mixed in), and an all white face for the male. In the yellow faces, the males usually have brighter colors but this comparison only works when you have both birds because diet has a lot to do with it. The lutinos, 'albinos' (actually, they are white face lutinos) and yellow cheeks need to be DNAd but the hens do have the barring on the underside of the tail only it's so light in the lutinos and albinos as to be almost undistinguishable. Pearls are almost always hens because the males will lose the 'pearls' as they molt (usually by the second molt but, sometimes, it takes a couple years more). Occasional, you will find a male that retains some of his pearls although they will become fainter as they get older.

[shiraartain]

I'm sorry for the delay in posting!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9FJ5v_UYpM

In the video, you can see that the cockatiel is making a distinctive heart-shape with his feathers while whistling. This is supposed to be an indicator of male 'tiels, from what I learned. Of course, it has been 2-3 years since I learned that, so it might have been proved otherwise by now.

[Wolf]

No video to watch. help!