I have a pair of cardinals in my front yard who like to raid the chicken coop yard, where I leave lots of goodies for my chickens and ducks.
Not too long ago, the female went into the yard under the coop and could not find her way out. I was concerned that the chickens would hurt her, so I went and got a towel and escorted her out.
When I let go of the female cardinal, she immediately flew away. But when a similar thing happened with her male counterpart, he was so stubbornly biting the towel I had tried to wrap him in that he almost did not realize he was free.
This is a very small sampling of cardinals, of course, so it may be the behavioral difference is due to individual characteristics of these two birds rather than their sex. But as anecdotal evidence goes, I tend to think that their sex may have had something to do with it.
