314 BULLETIN 16 2, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



but by her lack of scent. Leffingwell (1928) reports tests on prize- 

 winning dogs conducted by M. C. Ware, secretary of the Southern 

 Idaho Field Trail Club. Two of these dogs, " in ranging over a 

 large area, pointed twelve birds, all males. As pheasants are very 

 abundant here, many females were undoubtedly present but were not 

 found because of their scentlessness." Newly hatched young, like 

 the incubating female, appear also to be scentless, for " three newly 

 hatched pheasants found by Mr. Ware could not be located by the 

 dogs until the birds were seen." 



Pheasants have been known to lay their eggs in other birds' nests. 

 Leffingwell (1928) reports that A. A. Allen found a nest of a ruffed 

 grouse containing eight eggs of the owner and four of a pheasant, 

 and that Finley has found pheasant eggs in the nests of domestic 

 fowl, bobwhites, ruffed grouse, and sooty grouse. In England pheas- 

 ants have been observed to use the old nest of another bird in a tree 

 (Van de Weyer, 1919, and Tegetmeier, 1911). The nest itself con- 

 sists generally of a slight natural hollow in the ground, or one made 

 by the female, lined, sometimes very scantily, with leaves, grasses, or 

 weed stalks. 



Eggs. — [Author's note: The ring-necked pheasant lays 6 to 14 

 or 15 eggs, usually 10 to 12. They vary in shape from ovate to 

 short ovate. The shell is smooth with a very slight gloss. The 

 usual color is a rich, brownish olive, varying from " wood brown " 

 or " avellaneous " to " dark olive-buff " or " olive-buff." Some of 

 the darkest eggs are " buffy brown " and very rarely some eggs are 

 pale blue. The measurements of 29 eggs in the author's collection 

 average 41.85 by 33.5 millimeters ; the eggs showing the four extremes 

 measure 44.5 by 33.2, 42.6 by 35.1, 39.3 by 31.3, and 40 by 31.1 mil- 

 limeters. Witherby's handbook (1920) gives the average of 35 

 British eggs, a mixture of both races, as 45.93 by 36.04, the maxima 

 49.2 by 37 and 48 by 39, and the minima, 39 by 36.5 and 46.8 by 34.5 

 millimeters.] 



Young. — The length of incubation is stated to vary between 23 

 and 25 days. Leffingwell (1928) says of 656 birds constituting the 

 first hatch at a game club that 81.7 per cent hatched on the twenty- 

 third day, 15.5 per cent hatched on the twenty-fourth day, and 2.7 

 per cent hatched on the twenty-fifth day. In the second hatch 94.5 

 per cent hatched on the twenty-third day, the rest on the twenty- 

 fourth day. As a rule, the female alone incubates, but Tegetmeier 

 (1911) records an instance of a cock pheasant not only building the 

 nest but incubating and hatching the eggs, and he states that the 

 incubation by the male has been observed in several cases of wild 

 birds. 



As soon as the down on the chicks has dried after they have 

 escaped from the eggshell and have fluffed out their feathers, they 



