What bird did Noah send out first after the dove returned to the ark?

After the dove first returned, Noah sent the dove again after waiting seven days.

Genesis 8 describes a sequence of bird releases rather than a single flight. Noah first sent a raven, then sent a dove. The dove found no place to rest and returned to the ark, so Noah waited seven days before releasing the same dove again. On that second flight, it returned with a freshly plucked olive leaf.

After another seven-day interval, Noah sent the dove a third time. It did not return, indicating that the waters had receded and the bird could live outside the ark. Thus, the bird sent after the dove's first return was not a new species; it was the dove once more.

This detail is often compressed or omitted in popular summaries. Genesis presents the releases as a gradual observational process, with Noah using the birds to monitor conditions beyond the ark.