Recessive pied budge/ parakeet

[Hatching]

i know a budgie/parakeet forum would be a better place to ask this but hopefully someone will know the answer here. I'm having a difficult time sexing my recessive pied bird. This bird is 5+ years old, I don't know how old it was before I aquired it. Originally I thought it to be female and paired it with a male but they never bred, switched partners, nothing. Last year I read that it could be male as recessive pied cocks have "flesh" to pink/purple Ceres. I've paired it with 2 females so far and still nothing.

Anyone have any ideas. The blue yellowface bird in the back is the most recent pair and I know that one 100% to be female

 

[CherokeeTradition]

Hmm. Well I've raised birds off & on since 1991 & they sure can be picky lol. Have you tried changing the location of the cage? What are you feeding them? Lovely budgies!

 

[Hatching]

Hmm. Well I've raised birds off & on since 1991 & they sure can be picky lol. Have you tried changing the location of the cage? What are you feeding them? Lovely budgies!

Thank you for replying, I have changed the location, size and type of nestbox with each new pairing. I'm feeding them a budgie seed mix along with greens ( mostly kale, romaine, collared greens, whatever's on sale). The yellowface blue female has been spending increasing time in the nest box but I've never actually seen them mate. It won't be the end of the world if I can't get this bird to breed I just really enjoyed its color and pattern and thought to take his chicks to continue his pattern. Here's another picture I took when it was much less flighty the other day

 

[Finnie]

I think he is a male, but I would suggest that five years is too old for a budgie to breed. Since you don't know how much more older than 5 he is, his age is probably the reason it's not working.

As an aside, you wouldn't get any chicks like him anyway, unless their mother also carried the recessive pied gene, since it is recessive, and needs to come from both parents in order to be visual in the offspring. But you would get recessive pied split offspring, which you could use in the future to make more visual ones.