NOTE ON THE FOOD OF THE COMMON PHEASANT 249 



NOTE ON THE FOOD OF THE COMMON 

 PHEASANT. 



By Percy H. Grimshaw, F.R.S.E., F.E.S., Royal Scottish Museum. 



As a contribution to our knowledge of the dietary of the 

 Common Pheasant {Phasianus colchicus\ it may be of interest 

 to place on record the results of a detailed examination of 

 the contents of a crop kindly sent to me by Mr A. S. Leslie, 

 of the Grouse Disease Inquiry. He had received it from 

 Mr H. L. Macdonald, of Dunach, accompanied by a letter to 

 the following effect : " I send you herewith the crop of a 

 young pheasant cock shot on the hill here, and crammed with 

 the heather beetle. Although the grouse enquiry is closed, 

 I thought the fact that pheasants eat the beetle was of so 

 much interest, if not already known, that you would be kind 

 enough to send the crop on to the proper quarter for 

 examination. The bird was killed about 800 ft. above 

 sea-level and far from all crops, and there are a number of 

 pheasants on the hill. This year the beetle has done very 

 considerable damage to the heather on this estate. As I am 

 only a visitor here staying with the shooting tenant, I should 

 prefer that the name of the estate should not be published." l 

 Upon examining the crop I noticed at once that the bird 

 had indeed fed largely upon the heather beetle ; but there 

 was also present such a large mass of small diptera, that 

 I considered it advisable actually to count the number of 

 specimens rather than trust to a mere estimate. I therefore 

 give below a fairly complete statement of the contents of the 

 crop, and I believe that the number of specimens devoured 

 by this bird at a single meal will cause some astonishment. 



General statements regarding the food of this species 

 have been made in several works. For example, in Yarrell's 

 History of British Birds, 4th edition, vol. ill., p. 99, it is 

 stated that the Pheasant eats grain, seeds, and leaves of 

 various kinds, the root of the Bulbous Crowfoot (Ranunculus 

 bulbosus), the tubers of the Lesser Celandine {Ranunculus 



1 I am permitted to state that the bird was shot in the "Mid-Argyll 

 district of Argyllshire." 



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