PHEASANTS IN COVERT AND AVIARY 



once they are hatched. I have always noticed that wild 

 Pheasant chicks are a shade wilder and quicker than those 

 hatched from penned eggs, and I am quite sure that besides 

 being the only difference this wilder trait is a distinct dis- 

 advantage. It is nothing as long as the fronts are on, 

 but if one has to rear on a bare field and has both kinds 

 of chicks, he will soon know which he prefers when they 

 are let away. It is a dreary job counting a row of wild 

 Pheasants at feeding-time and as dreary a job getting them 

 shut up at nights after they are any size. There is no real 

 proof that the wild chicks grow better or quicker than the 

 others ; many a rearer imagines they do so because he 

 wishes them to be so, though that is not quite the same 

 thing. I know also that the wild birds die just like the 

 others when any of the real troubles come to the rearing- 

 field ; it is no argument to say that they do not die from 

 like causes outside, as the conditions are "very widely 

 different. Finally, no one can say the wild birds fly a bit 

 better or higher than the others on shooting days, if they 

 are fed the same, and somehow I have a conviction that 

 they retain their wandering propensities till the day of 

 their death. To my mind there is no comparison possible 

 between the two kinds of eggs ; if time, trouble, and the 

 certainty of getting the best results from outlay and work 

 are all taken into proper consideration, the penned eggs 

 have it easily. And what can there really be in the question 

 of Stamina ? We all know that even our breeds of domestic 

 fowls give of their best only when they are specially fed 

 and sheltered ; more especially is this true from the point 

 of view of either quantity or fertility, and why the identically 

 same treatment should be wrong for the less hardy Pheasant 

 beats me to understand. I know that there are men who 

 invite disease even in their Pheasant pens, through the 



120 



