Hans Stefani—Breeding the Blue Eared-Pheasant 389


55 gr. Two days again between the tenth to the fifteenth, but the

last two, the sixteenth and seventeenth, were laid at intervals of three

days. They were all laid punctually at about 7 p.m.


As Brown Eared-Pheasants will not incubate in confinement,

I concluded that the Blue would behave in like manner, so I took the

eggs as soon as they were laid and put them under a domestic hen.

All were fertile. The incubation lasted from 27 to 30 days.


The chicks are very active and independent, they need little

brooding and rarely seek the warmth of their foster mother. They

are easily reared on ants’ eggs, worms, and a good deal of green stuff,

but they eat considerably more than other Pheasant chicks. During

the first weeks of their lives they are very lethargic after a meal, and

usually squat down on the ground in order to digest their food at

leisure. Although they are usually peaceable together, greed at feeding

time causes many squabbles during which neither will give way.

Their fondness for worms sometimes misleads the chicks while still very

young into thinking that the feet of their brethren are worms and to

seize hold of them. They hold on so tight and are so determined to

secure the fancied tit-bit that the owner of the toes falls on his back

kicking before the other realizes his mistake. Dislocated and even

broken toes sometimes result, for which reason weaker species must

never be associated with young Eared-Pheasants for fear of having

their feet mutilated.


Thanks to their excellent appetites the chicks grew with extra¬

ordinary rapidity. They were as large as a fair-sized domestic hen

by the time they were two months old.


In down the Blue Eared-Pheasants scarcely differ from the Brown

at the same stage, but when they are about a month old their blue

plumage shows plainly.


Blue Eared-Pheasants, like their brown cousins, are tame and

confiding with human beings, unlike the timidity usually shown by

young Pheasant chicks.


It is greatly to be hoped that this rare Pheasant will be permanently

established in Europe. If they can be at liberty in a large garden they

are useful in destroying injurious insects and charm their owners by

their remarkable tameness and beautiful colouring.



