I feel really sorry for today’s small game hunters who have not had the opportunity to hunt the ring-necked pheasant. The experience of a male cock bird busting from cover and cackling loudly is certainly something vivid to the hunter. I have had the opportunity to hunt pheasants hundreds of times. It was always a fun hunt; especially with family and friends.
Today, the status of pheasant hunting in Pennsylvania is almost completely hunting over pen-raised birds. While this was also true in the 1960’s when I started hunting, we did have a significant number of wild birds as well. In Part I & II we looked at those 1960’s and '70’s glory hunting days and how land practices have changed so much. This week, a look at predators and how they related to the loss of pheasants.
Perhaps the greatest threat to pheasants are avian predators; hawks and owls. I remember Bill Hardle, Assistant Regional Director with the Pennsylvania Fish Commission at Bellefonte and a good friend. Bill told me that he assisted stocked pheasants one day. The next day he decided to hunt one of the areas where he helped stock birds. He told me that he found several dead pheasants with only their heads eaten. This almost certainly means the Great Horned Owl or a weasel or mink. Freshly stocked pheasants are easy prey.
Pen raised pheasants have no experience when it comes to predators because they have not had to deal with any in their brief say 25 weeks of life. They are quite easy prey for any predator. especially avian ones. Any wild predator will kill and eat anything in nature that does not kill it. So the predator list includes both the red & gray fox, coyotes, bobcats, owls, skunks, feral cats and vehicles. It is a wonder that any birds actually survive.
Wild pheasants are constantly keeping cover in mind wherever they roam. When not actually foraging, wild birds use heavy cover almost exclusively. When I hunted pheasants without a dog, I always sought heavy cover and made sure that I used safety glasses. Many times I ended up with a bloody ear or nose; but I usually flushed a few birds had at least one for a meal.
The last several pheasant hunts for me have been on regulated shooting grounds. The birds are stocked and then one hunts a certain section only. I can tell you that these places have lots of cover and all have hedgerows. While it is a nice way to hunt birds; not everyone can fork over $22.00 for one stocked bird.
Perhaps one of the greatest threats to pheasants is the Avian Flu. I never even considered this until a fellow hunter brought it to my attention and I read a recent article in Pennsylvania Outdoor News that the Pennsylvania Game Commission is concerned about birds becoming infected at their game farms.
There are some projects ongoing to restore wild pheasants in Pennsylvania. We will look at those efforts in our next column.
Jim Collins is an outdoor writer for this newspaper. To contact him, email jimcollinsinsurance@frontiernet.net; or write to him at Outdoors With Jim Collins, 87 Windfall Road, Alba, PA 16910.