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Abstract

Despite this species of bird is widely in distribution in Northern Nigeria, scanty documentation exist on the neuroanatomy of this species of wild bird. Measurement of weight, length, width, height and volume of the intact brain, cerebrum and cerebellum were conducted using; a sensitive electronic balance (Mettler P 1210, Mettler AG, Switzerland, Sensitivity 0.001g), volume was estimated by water displacement method. Measurements of the dimensions of each brain, forebrain and the cerebellum were obtained using a digital vernier caliper, meter ruler and thread. Thirty wild rock pigeons (15 male and 15 females) were used for this study. The mean body weights obtained from this study were observed to be 214.4±13.37 g and 218.6±12.05 g for female and male, respectively. The mean brain weight values obtained from female and male were 1.611±0.07 g and 1.72±0.07 g, respectively. There was no significant difference in the mean length of both sexes (Table 2). The percentage forebrain lengths were about 67.13 % for both sexes (Table 2) and the mean brain volume of the female wild rock pigeon is higher than that of the male. The mean brain height of the female was lower as compared to that of the male, even though there were no significant differences in their mean heights. Indications from various segments of this study show that the mean body and the brain weights of the male wild rock pigeon were higher than those of the female.