134 



THE OOLOGIST. 



the busy meu, this Mougoliau should 

 be kept out. 



He rises early and gets iu all the time 

 there is. As a provocation of profanity 

 he is irresistable, and missionary effort 

 among your vine culturalists and berry 

 men will be useless in a few years after 

 you introduce this Pheasant. The law 

 foi" his ijrotection here is practically a 

 dead letter. Every one who hunts car- 

 ries a tight game-bag, and it is an un- 

 written law, implicitly obeyed, that no 

 one else tries to see what he has in it." 



My further acquaintance with this 

 bird has greatly moditied the unfavor- 

 able opinion given above. He does eat 

 some berries and small fruits and he 

 does forage some on ''garden truck;" 

 lettuce, onions, cabbage &c., he espec- 

 ially effects, but he is a great insect 

 eater. Grasshoppers, cutworms, green- 

 worms, et genius entomo, are his pecul- 

 iar delight. He digs cutworms out of 

 sod with his strong beak, and is a most 

 expert and persevering grasshopperist. 

 The young birds are active, feather 

 quickly, and a little brown, chick no 

 bigger than the end of your thumb, can 

 catch a grasshopper too easy. They 

 also catch flies, moths, &c. of all sorts 

 found among grass and weeds, and 

 they especially delight in aphids. If 

 your cabbage, kale, rutabagas and such 

 become "lousy" a brood of Pheasant 

 chicks is a .sure remedy. 



In this way he helps to raise the 

 fruits and vegetables, and is certainly 

 entitled to seme share, as compension. 

 And I am not prepared to assert that 

 he takes more than his just dues. And 

 I think that Mr. Asher Tyler, quoted 

 above would now modify his sweeping 

 statement as to their destructiveness. 



Mr. Asher's statement that the young 

 are "easily raised," and that they '•be- 

 come very domestic," is not in accord- 

 ance with my experience. The young 

 are fairlj' easy to raise under proper 

 conditions. The ■wild hens raise them 

 easy enough, but with a common dom- 



estic hen it is different. The chicks do 

 not eat grain at tirst, but subsist entire- 

 ly on insects, liies, bugs, &c. which they 

 can catch among gi'ass and weeds. 



Some substitute food must be pro- 

 vided when they are kept iu confine- 

 ment. They require to be kept dry 

 and warm, more so than domestic 

 chicks. They need plenty of hovering, 

 and the mother hen should be handy 

 and understand her business. They 

 have some other peculiarities also, that 

 should be understood to insure success, 

 but this article is already spinning out 

 too long. 



. With us they do not become very 

 domestic. They are shy, shrewd, 

 very suspicious and afraid of strangers. 

 We have to keep them confined or they 

 would leave. We live in a small vil- 

 lage. If we were on a large farm 

 where they would not be hunted or 

 otherwise disturbed, they would stay 

 ai'ound, but they would keep out of 

 sight mostly and they could only be 

 caught with a gun. They cannot be 

 trapped or snared. They are too sharp 

 for that. 



No finer game bird runs or flies. He 

 will not "tree" but lies close to the 

 ground, and a dog that understands 

 him, can hold him a long time. When 

 flushed he flies straight aAvay, cackling 

 loudly. When winged he is yet hard to 

 get, if there is cover of anj' kind, as he 

 has got the most useful pair of legs ou 

 him of any game bird. 



He is the beloved of the sportsman, 

 the disgust of the bungler, the despair 

 of the trapper. Wherever he is intro- 

 duced he will learn some new tricks to 

 bother the "shootist" and his dog. The 

 male's brilliant plumage renders him 

 conspicuous, and he needs to be sharp 

 to take cai'e of himself. They are hardy 

 from the time they are weaned, and I 

 see no reason why this Pheasant should 

 not become the game bird of the U. S. 

 F. S. Matteson, 

 Turner, Oregon. 



