All first-time bird owners come home from the pet shop like they‘re bringing a baby back from the hospital. They’re happy and excited. Many would expect the birds to begin breeding soon, and along with the cage, they will also buy nests and cuttlebone and other things that will ensure the two birds will become good bird-parents. The new owners will wait for two to three months, which is what the pet store manager said was necessary for the birds to adjust to their new surroundings and start mating. By the sixth month, the new owners would be really frustrated because the birds haven’t even laid a single egg yet, and would probably return to the pet store for confrontation. Only then would everybody find out that the pair they brought home were both male.

If you wouldn’t want this to happen to you, and you would really want to take home a pair of finches, then read on.

Unlike dogs or cats and other mammalian pets, telling the sex of finches is as hard for the first time owner as say, flying a helicopter. This is because there are no obvious sex organs that will clearly distinguish the female bird from its counterpart. What both sexes have for a reproductive organ is called the cloaca, virtually just a small opening near their tails. The cloaca also serves as the excretory organ for the birds, where bird poop comes out. So how do we tell the male finch from the female finch? The answer: by their colors. The most common finches in the Philippines are the zebra and gouldian finch, and this article will focus on these two.

Male zebra finches usually exhibit the more dominant colors of the species. They will have the red beak, orange cheeks, black breasts and the dark brown spots on their feathers. The females on the other hand has a lighter orange beak, and will generally be plain colored white, grey, or light brown. An exception to this is the White Zebra, wherein both male and female are completely white. In this case, the only distinction between their gender is the color of the beaks, red for the male, and orange for the female. Sometimes also, males might not exhibit the orange cheeks and the black breasts due to gene pairings. But just the same, the males will have the red beak and the females will have orange beaks for these variations. That seems easy to remember, right? Yes, but not quite. The beak colors are only prominently red or orange once the birds reach breeding age. For one to three month finches, all finches seem to have orange beaks. Look for the dominant colors first, before looking at the beaks.

Gouldian finches are harder to visually sex because both sexes sport vibrant colors. There are two variations of the gouldian finch–the purple and the white breasted. For the purple breasted finch, the male will exhibit the darker purple color. With the white breasted, two other indications are available for distinction. The male will have a larger blue ring around its head as compared to the female. The female on the other hand will have dark, almost black, beak during breeding.

If you’re still not certain whether you can tell the sexes of the finches apart, buy from a seasoned finch breeder, like the ones featured on FinchMe’s Breeders page. Hardcore breeders know the sex of a finch without even looking at it. Hehe. =) That’s because the male finch sings, while the female only produces that beep-beep sound. Now that’s another way to make sure that what you’re bringing home is a legal pair.