42



Dr. L. Lovell-Keays.



A PAPER ON SEXING PARRAKEETS,


AS ILLUSTRATED BY CERTAIN OF THE BROADTAILS.

By Dr. L. Lovell-Keays.


This article is not intended to be a recondite treatise on sexing

birds, but I trust it may be of help in determining the sex of certain

of the Plcitycercina ( i.e . Broadtails). Lately I have taken up parra-

keets, and I was at once struck by the apparent difficulty people had

of sexing the parrakeets they offered to me. Out of upwards of fifty

birds only quite a few, in which it was impossible to make a mistake,

came to me properly sexed. I think one may take it as an indis¬

putable fact that sexing birds is to a great extent a gift. But it can

be cultivated and greatly improved with practice, accurate observa¬

tion and patience.


These remarks are somewhat in the way of an apology for

writing so elementary a paper, and yet I remember my friend Major

Perreau remarking that he thought one got most help and more

interest from the earlier numbers of his bird papers than from the

later ones. We are apt to think that what we have learnt or found

out everybody else has, but it is not so, and very often the most

elementary papers are those most eagerly read.


To return to our parrakeets. It is obvious I think that it is

fairly hopeless to attempt to sex immature specimens, at any rate in

the majority of species. One may often make a guess, more or less

lucky, but one cannot tell certainly. This is, I think, particularly

true in such birds as Pennants, Redrumps, and so on.


Given a mature specimen, how are we to commence ? You

must get the birds in a good light, and if possible in a cage and as

near each other as possible. In most cases, it is almost entirely a

matter of comparison, and to sex individual or isolated birds is often

exceedingly difficult, if not impossible.


Now the chief points of difference are as follows : —


(1) The size and shape of the beak.


(2) The size of the bird.


(3) The shape of the bird, particularly the head and shoulders.


(4) The colour.



