COREAN PHEASANT 



Phasianus colchicus karpowi Buturlin 



Names.— Subspecific : karpozvi, named in honour of A. W. Karpow, who collected the type specimen. 

 English: Corean Ring-necked Pheasant. Japanese: Korai-kiji (Corean Pheasant). 



Type.— Locality : Te-lin, Southern Manchuria. Describer : Buturlin. Place of Description : Orn Monatb 

 XII. 1904, p. 3. 



Subspecific Characters.— Very close to torquatus, but with the flank-feathers darker, more of a golden- 

 brown. 



GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION 



Southern Manchuria throughout Corea, and in the island of Tsushima. In 

 Manchuria it extends as far north as Kirin. I have a specimen from Chaoyang in 

 Chili, which is typical karpowi, except that the sub-aural white spots are very faint. 

 This form, doubtless, merges with both pallasi and forquatus at certain points of 

 contact. 



GENERAL ACCOUNT 



In answer to a series of questions, Mr. Roy C. Andrews has kindly given me an 

 excellent summary of his knowledge of these birds. He says, ''In southern Corea I 

 hunted pheasants at Ulsan, forty miles north of Fusan, on the east coast. The country 

 there consists of a succession of hills from fifty to five hundred feet high with narrow and 

 deep valleys between. The hills are of red and yellow clay with but little rock, and are 

 covered on the sides with bush-firs from two to four feet high. The summits of the 

 hills are frequently sparsely wooded with fir-trees ten to twenty feet high. The valleys 

 are almost always of terraced rice paddys ; along the edges there are pools and streamlets 

 and also a considerable amount of standing water in the paddys themselves when the 

 days are warm enough for the ground to thaw. The pheasants were hunted during 

 January and February, and at this season were always found on the side of the hills and 

 in the low bush-firs, and seldom, if ever, on the summits. 



" During these months the Corean Pheasant gave no call ; no sound of any kind was 

 uttered by either the male or female. In the spring, however, I was told that the 

 pheasant is continually crowing. 



'' I have never witnessed fighting on the part of the males or seen any evidence of it. 

 The heat of the day is spent in the cover of the low bush-firs on the ground, and it is 

 impossible to flush the birds during the middle of the day. I have repeatedly hunted 

 them from twelve o'clock till three, and was never able to put a bird up, but later in the 

 day, over the same ground, any number would rise. 



"The flight is a succession of rapid wing-beats, followed by intervals of sailing. 



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