Gloucester County Democrat., 1902-07-31
RAISING PHEAsANTs.
3 Breeder of These Beautiful Birds
Tells How He Cares For Them.

Breeder of These Beautiful Birds
Tells How He Cares For Them.
The pheasant industry has become
very popular in the United States of
late years on account of the large de-
mand for stocking parks and by indi-
viduals for breeding purposes.
The pheasant has most beautiful
form, attractive head. short wings and
an elegant long tail, adorned with bril-
liant spangled plumage. / handle a
large flock Of pheasants. l generally
mate in pairs, in early sping, some
times mating two hens with one male
l keep them in separate small parks
about by 10 feet. / say park be-
cause a pheasant does not require any
housing. The only thing / do for their
protection is to plant small evergreen
trees in the middle of the parks. These
birds, being of very hardy constitution,
will stand almost any kind of weather
and will not take shelter at any time.
In all my experience / never have had
sick pheasant. Diseases so common
among chickens, as roup, ETC.. have
never yet occurred in my focks. In
July I change cock birds, putting those
which, ,sAave not been used in breeding
pens that season with the hens, and
every egg is fertile up to the last one
laid.
Pheasants are very tame with their
1yna OF In, HA{,.
with strangers. The male birds are
great fighters, and two of them very
rarely live in the same park during the
breeding season. A pheasant hen lays
from fifty-five to sixty-tiye eggs in a
season. commencing in April and con-
tinuing until the middle of August. She
makes her nest on the ground. They
are poor mothers, at least in confine-
ment, being so shy. They do not seem
to have much natural love for their
young. Therefore to raise young use
small, common hens. The eggs hatch
in about twenty-four days.
The most important point in raising
the young pheasants is to rid the sit
ting hen of lice and the red mite. and
this is not such an easy task as some
people think it is. | saw an article
on pheasants in the New York Times
some time ago in which it said that
Pierre Lorillard imported 1000 pleas
ant eggs. After being hatched a few
weeks most of the birds died. and the
cause could not be determined. Now,
would suggest that almost to GER
tainty those birds were killed by wor-
riment from hen lice and nothing else
The first three or four weeks feed
hard boiled eggs. dry bread crumbs and
a little canary and millet seed-about
one egg to eight young daily-and give
free range. An excellent pasture for
them is a clover patch or close by let
tuce bed. never touch the feed with
my hands.
I use large, airy dry goods box for
a coop. Take off one side and put
poultry wire netting instead. Station
it in a shady spot or else cover the
top with bushes. place a yard of
twelve inch boards about three feet
square around the coops for the first
three days in order that the young
may get used to the mothers call and
not wander off. Pheasants when
Matched are very strong and ready to
eat at once. principally dry bread
crumbs for the first day l claim that
nothing but lice to worry them kills
the young. They are as easy to raise
as chickens | raised rs per cent last
year. and most of my birds were
hatched in August When four weeks
old. feed variety of grain. Pheas-
ants are small feeders. Feed for ten
head of fowl is enough for thirty
pheasants.
| give them plenty of brush to roost
on, which is an important point to OBJ
serve. as they cannot bear standing
on the bare ground. also give plenty
of shelter from the northwest winds.
Pheasants grow very fast and have
their full plumage. with the long tail.
when FIVE months old.-Fred Sudow in
Poultry Monthly.