:2:H) The Golden Pheasant. 



" In selecting the brood stock, a cock with four or even 

 five hens will be a fair proportion. I always prefer a cock 

 bird of the second year and hens of the same age (because 

 they lay far naore eggs), though the eggs of pullets of the 

 preceding year are productive. The young hens will only 

 lay ten or twelve eggs in a season, but the older birds when 

 carefully managed will frequently lay thirty to forty eggs in 

 the same period. These eggs require a longer incubation 

 than those of common fowls, as they generally hatch on the 

 twenty-fourth day, though I have repeatedly known them 

 continue in the shell a day longer ; therefore, if desirous of 

 rearing a chicken or two with them (to insure greater 

 familiarity), the fowls' eggs must be deposited accordingly, 

 as nothing tends so sadly to unsettle a hen at hatching time 

 as some portions of her chicks coming a day or two previously 

 to the remainder, and it not unfrequently leads to the desertion 

 of her nest. 



" The eggs laid in an aviary should be at once removed 

 from Golden Pheasants directly they are laid ; the cocks being 

 especially inclined to peck and eat them the moment they 

 are produced. The best remedy I know is to procure half 

 a dozen artificial eggs, and let them lie about always, and 

 then the birds, seeing them constantly, regard them less. 

 They are raised in confinement much more easily than the 

 common pheasant, the young growing with great rapidity if 

 well and frequently fed on custard, boiled eggs, good cheese — 

 all chopped fine — and mixed with bruised hemp and canary 

 seed. The maggots produced in flesh from the blow-fly will 

 tend very greatly to their rapid growth. I am perfectly aware 

 that ants' eggs are preferable, but when these are not available 

 maggots will be found an excellent substitute, and should be 

 given daily till the poults are somewhat grown. Wheat, hemp, 

 and barley are the best food for the old stock. It is somewhat 

 singular that neither variety will agree comfortably with the 

 common pheasants in a wood ; notwithstanding, I have seen 

 the hybrids produced between these birds and the common 



