How to Tell Male & Female Mourning Birds Apart

Mourning birds, or doves are commonly found across North America. Male doves display for hens during the breeding season. This ritual involves producing a cooing call and bowing in front of the perched female. The female ignores these advances if the male does not interest her, but allows copulation if she approves of the male. Mourning doves mate for life and perform various rituals that strength the pair's bond. The pair preen or groom each other during the mating season and the female inserts her bill into the male's open bill. This behavior is then typically followed by mating.

Things You'll Need

  • Digital scale
  • Small cardboard box
  • Veterinarian with endoscope
  • Laboratory and blood sample
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Instructions

    • 1

      Look very closely at the eye rings of the two birds. The eye ring of a male, which is older than four months, will be a bright orange color and almost twice as wide as that of the female or hen.

    • 2

      Look at the two birds sitting together if they are more than six months old. The larger of the two birds will be male. This size difference is subtle though, so you need to observe the birds closely. There is not a visible size difference if the birds are younger than six months.

    • 3

      Observe the color on the bird's plumage if they are older than six months. The bird with a blue to grey coloration across the back and on the upper wings is a male mourning dove. The female bird will have a noticeable brownish tinge to her body and wings.

    • 4

      Weigh the mourning doves, if they are older than six months, and if you are able to handle them easily. Weigh a small, empty cardboard box on a digital scale. Place the first dove into the box and weight the bird and box. Subtract this combined weight from the weight of the empty box. The result is the weight of the bird.

    • 5

      Repeat the weighing with the second bird. The male bird will weigh approximately 1.1-ounces, while the female will weigh approximately 1.0-ounces. The weight difference is very slight, so you always need to use a digital scale.

    • 6

      Listen carefully to the two birds. The dove that is most vocal is the male bird. The female dove will also have a higher pitch to her voice.

    • 7

      Observe the behavior of the two doves. The bird which repeatedly bows down and touches its beak to the perch, branch or ground, is the male bird. This bird will also fan out his tail at the same time and vocalize by making cooing sounds.

    • 8

      Watch the mating act. The dove which clutches the perch and remains sitting is the female. The bird which mounts the sitting bird is the male.

    • 9

      Request your veterinarian to surgically sex the birds, using an endoscope.

    • 10

      Request your veterinarian to have the birds DNA sexed, by having a laboratory examine a blood sample under the microscope.