March, 1906 
The 
of Pheasants and _ their 
Value on the Country Estate 
By George Ethelbert Walsh 
Breeding 
HE small home pheasantry 
is of modern growth. A 
decade ago it was consid- 
ered rank heresy for any 
one to advocate the breed- 
ing and rearing of hand- 
some pheasants from China or India on a small country 
place. Great estates, with miles of primeval forests, 
wooded hills and extensive upland thickets, were the first 
essentials for pheasant raising, and even then it was con- 
sidered somewhat doubtful if the handsome birds would sur- 
vive our cold winters and multiply in numbers. A stocking 
of a few of the large estate a dozen and twenty years ago 
with choice specimens of imported pheasants was undertaken 
at great expense, and the birds were allowed to run wild over 
great stretches of woods and upland brush and breed as they 
saw fit in their wild habitat. 
One of the first amateur breeders of pheasants to dispel 
the illusion concerning these remarkable birds was Mr. 
Homer Davenport, the famous cartoonist, who on his small 
East Orange place succeeded in raising and breeding some 
of the choicest of imported pheasants. With scarcely more 
ground than found around the ordinary suburban home, Mr. 
Davenport soon had a flock of nearly two score choice pheas- 
ants, and for years he added new importations to his stock 
until their numbers were too great for his limited space. 
Since then numerous other amateur and professional breed- 
ers have made the small home pheas- 
antry a success. Pheasant breeding 
has thus become a popular industry 
on many farms, country estates and 
small suburban places. 
Of all wild or domesticated birds 
the pheasants are the most beautiful 
in plumage and the most graceful in 
physical contour of body and limbs. 
This somewhat general statement may 
be modified so as to apply only to cer- 
tain breeds and varieties, but most of 
the twenty-six or more varieties known 
to man are without exception the very 
personification of grace and beauty. 
A few are so exceptionally brilliant 
in their coloring as to defy imitation, 
and in comparison the plumage of 
even the gay bird-of-paradise suf- 
fers somewhat. Fortunately for the 
ordinary breeder it is not always 
the most gorgeously-colored pheas. 
ant that is the rarest and most 
expensive, although plumage counts 
for much and always proves an 
AMERICAN HOMES 
A Reeves Cock Four Years Old, with Tail 
Five Feet Eleven and One-half Inches Long 
AND GARDENS 179 
important factor in the price question. 
The most commonly bred pheasants in 
this country—and these are all suited to \) 
the home pheasantry—are the Golden, 
Silver, Lady Amherst, Reeves, Elliotts, 
Japanese, Impeyan, Tragopans, and the 
English and Mongolian varieties. Most of our hand- 
somest pheasants are found in China and India, but a 
few come from other tropical and semi-tropical lands 
and islands of the Pacific. Nearly all the colors of the rain- 
bow are found in the plumage of such varieties as the male 
bird of the Golden pheasant, the Reeves, the Versicolor and 
the beautiful Ringnecks. With the sun glistening on their 
plumage, the lights and shadows present startling, almost 
magic, effects to bewilder the eye. 
One may raise pheasants for the profit there is in the in- 
dustry, but most of us are content to breed them for pets and 
companions. ‘There are few feathered creatures that can 
excite an equal amount of interest on the country place. For 
small pens or large park-like inclosures, their graceful forms 
contrast beautifully with the green of grass and trees and 
rival in changing colors the most gorgeous of garden flowers. 
Pheasants are very susceptible to kind treatment, and they 
can be tamed so that they show no fear of the one who feeds 
them. Dogs and cats, however, excite them, and _ these 
animals must be sternly kept from the neighborhood of the 
pens or yards. It is even necessary to run baseboards a few 
feet up the side of the wire inclosure 
to keep dogs from annoying the pheas- 
ants when the two are kept on the 
same place. 
The pheasantry should always have 
a southerly exposure on high, well- 
drained ground, and with good soil 
that will raise clover, timothy, rape, 
oats and barley. The pheasantry is 
not very much unlike quarters pro- 
vided for fancy ‘chickens. There 
should be a yard inclosed by a wire 
netting, a house for shelter from in- 
clement weather and for roosting, and 
breeding or nesting quarters attached. 
Pheasants will do well in much more 
limited quarters than were formerly 
considered necessary for their proper 
K Se growth. In Central Park, for instance, 
the average amount of running space 
allotted to three or four birds is not 
more than 10 by 20 feet. The writer 
knows of a case where sixty pheasants 
were reared and kept in excellent con- 
dition in a house 50 by to feet, and 
g 
