294 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 



There can be no doubt that if the Pheasant were not arti- 

 ficially reared and annually turned down in this country, it 

 would soon cease to exist, for, in hard winters especially, 

 the birds left for stock are largely dependent on artificial 

 feeding. The chief food consists of grain, seeds, berries, and 

 young shoots, varied with insects and grubs, wireworms being 

 a favourite morsel. 



Pure-bred examples of P. colchicus are now rarely to be met 

 with in England, the great majority of birds being hybrids with 

 the Chinese Ring-necked Pheasant (P. torquatus), which was 

 subsequently introduced. 



Like the rest of its kind, the Pheasant, though it roosts and 

 often perches on trees, is essentially a ground bird, and a tre- 

 mendous runner ; the old cocks, having learnt wisdom from 

 past experience, frequently refuse to rise at the net and face 

 the guns so anxiously waiting to salute them, and may be seen 

 running back among the beaters as fast as their legs can carry 

 them. The whir made in rising is loud and startling, but 

 when once well on the wing, the Pheasant's flight is extremely 

 swift, being performed by rapid and incessant beats of the 

 rounded wing, and when coming high, down wind, the pace 

 at which a good " rocketer " can travel is almost incredible. 



During the nesting-season the hen Pheasant has numerous 

 enemies to contend with, the most formidable being the 

 prowling Fox, who seizes her as she sits on her nest, and the 

 Rooks and Crows, both Hooded and Carrion, who steal and 

 suck her eggs. A curious instance of the enormous amount of 

 damage done by Crows came under my notice in May, 1893. 



With a friend, I was passing through a Scotch fir plantation 

 forming part of a large estate in the north of Scotland, where 

 thousands of Pheasants are annually reared and turned down. 

 The plantation ran along about a hundred feet above the rocky 

 sea-coast, and as we advanced along the slippery path, we found 

 several sucked pheasant's eggs, evidently the work of Crows, 

 nor had we gone far before we came suddenly upon a whole 

 family of Hooded rascals, five young and two old birds. In 

 the course of about a quarter of a mile, we counted over a 

 hundred empty shells which had evidently been carried to the 

 path and there devoured. How many more might have been 

 discovered had we searched it is impossible to say, but we saw 



