KOREAN AND MANCHURIAN RING-NECKED PHEASANTS 
The group of true pheasants includes both Koreanringnecks and 
Japanese green pheasants. Two subspecies of the Korean pheasant are 
recognized, The Manchurian ringneck (P. c. pallasi) inhabits North 
Korea and the mainland in eastern Manchuria largely north of the 38th 
parallel. The South Korean pheasant (P. c. karpowi) is resident south 
of the parallel in Manchuria and South Korea. 
Both Korean and Japanese green pheasants are included in this re- 
port. This is in part because of similarities in their life histories 
and habitats, in part since they are the only two pheasants resident in 
eastern Asia to be studied by Foreign Game Introduction personnel to 
date. Both have many characteristics in common with ringnecks in the 
United States. Both are agricultural land species but they also thrive, 
to a greater extent than do our ringnecks, in the brushy or wooded 
coverts adjacent to cultivated valleys or uplands. Korean and, toa 
lesser extent, northern Japanese green pheasants occupy ranges charac- 
terized by wide variations in temperature and in precipitation and by 
considerable snow in winter. Of the two species, the Korean pheasant 
is adaptable to the colder climate, the Japanese green to a more humid 
one. The climatic pattern within the range of the Japanese green pheas- 
ant is predominantly peninsular in character; whereas the Korean sub- 
species survives under both peninsular and continental types of climate. 
In their native range in Asia no other true pheasant is found as 
far north as the Manchurian, and only a few other subspecies are dis- 
tributed at latitudes equal to that of the South Korean pheasant. Thus 
it is understandable that some States north of the Mason and Dixon line 
would be interested in the possibility that one or both of the pheasants 
mentioned above might prove adaptable to potential pheasant habitat 
not now adequately occupied by the introduced ringneck. Consideration 
of this possibility has, to date, been limited to the South Korean 
ringneck. About 50 of these birds were secured in 1960 and were dis- 
tributed, as breeding stock, to 5 State game farms. Efforts to secure 
wild-trapped Manchurian pheasants are being continued, 
Taxonomy and Distribution 
According to Delacour (8) the true pheasants are represented by 31 
subspecies of the genus Phasianus. He further subdivides these into 
several groups. The Korean-Manchurian pheasants belong to the gray- 
rumped group which is composed of 18 subspecies, distributed from Mon- 
golia, Manchuria, China and Korea to Formosa. 
This report is concerned largely with the pheasant that is resident 
in South Korea and southern Manchuria. Delacour calls this bird the 
Korean ringneck (P. c. karpowi) but indicates that, between latitudes 37°. 
and 40°N., in Korea there exists an unstable population intermediate in 
35 
