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Black pheasants? (1 Viewer)

morag

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Two of my friends have reported seeing a bird which is black and looks like a pheasant.
Although I live in Scotland, there are no black grouse or capercaille in my local area.
So, can you get black pheasants?
 
Hi, Morag. Yes, you can. It's just an ordinary pheasant with an excess of melanin (black) in its feathers, not a separate species.
 
Strange as it may seem this topic came up in the pub only last night!

You can indeed get melanistic (black or very dark) pheasants. We were in Scotland many years ago on an autumn fishing trip and the roads and fields around Dollar and Crieff were seemingly thick with them.
 
Actually they ARE a separate race: Chinese Pheasant (see Heinzel Fitter Parslow!) They are quite common in Broadland, and many people think they qualify as a full species.
 
Last spring I visited a nearby woodland. The blackcaps were particularly resonant, but I spotted a melanistic pheasant. There were an abundance of males visible because there was a breeding ground nearby for gaming purposes.

Searching for melanistic pheasants on Google images often brings up links to gaming websites. The melanistic genes can be carried on to descendants. I wonder if they are bred intentionally to allow gamers to see them better? (though I would think the regular plumage was more suitable)
 
Thanks, Inspector. But I'm confused now. I've only got an old edition of Heinzel, Fitter & Parslow, but it gives the bird you mention as a separate species Phasianus versicolor (calling it "Japanese Pheasant or Green Pheasant"). BWP says that male P. versicolor (which has been introduced in some areas) can be confused with menanistic examples of male Common Pheasant Phasianus colchicus and that the two form a superspecies! Mind you, I only speed-read BWP so may have missed something.
 
Still way ahead of me, Inspector - I had to look it up! What's more, I've learnt something interesting.

Needless to say, however, I shall curse you at my leisure since now, whenever I see a black pheasant, I shall have to work out which sodding species it is!!! ;)
 
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Could of course be some crazy breed. As i have seen some strange escapee cross breeds including multi coloured malards. A bird that looks half bluetit half great tit and a rather suspicous looking farmyard goose.
 
There are loads of pheasants released up here in Northumberland for shooting and we often get all shades...just down at the base of the hill I often see a male who is extremely dark with no neck ring and I have a very dark female who comes into my garden most days.

Perhaps they ARE all different species...oooh I could gain a few easy lifer ticks tomorrow. ESPECIALLY if I don't look TOO hard! ;)

Gill
 
Gill Osborne said:
There are loads of pheasants released up here in Northumberland for shooting and we often get all shades...just down at the base of the hill I often see a male who is extremely dark with no neck ring and I have a very dark female who comes into my garden most days.

Perhaps they ARE all different species...oooh I could gain a few easy lifer ticks tomorrow. ESPECIALLY if I don't look TOO hard! ;)

Gill

Things do evolve ;) lol and tehcnicaly isn't the pheasnet with the ring a diferent species to the one without? O__o
 
RaptorMan said:
tehcnicaly isn't the pheasnet with the ring a diferent species to the one without? O__o

There are two different possibilities (as mentioned earlier). First is a melanistic Ring-necked/Common Pheasant, which is exactly the same as the usualy pheasant, just with more melanin than usual. The second possibility is the Japanese Green Pheasant. Most seem to believe it is a different species, but other think it's only an isolated subspecies of the Ring-necked/Common.
 
Black pheasants.

I just rounded a corner in the Fir and Pond Woods Nature Reserve, Potters Bar, on Oct 18th and to my surprise 2 (? a pair) of black pheasants were wandering down the path. I didn't know such birds existed. They kept 20 metres ahead of me so my snatched photo is not really worth posting. They didn't look melanistic to me.

David Gompertz. Volunteer Warden. Herts and Middlesex Wildlife Trust.
 
Used to see loads like this in North Yorkshire, when I lived up there, especially in the Danby, Egton Bridge area. I'm sure they're just Commons though.
 
Tim Hall said:
Used to see loads like this in North Yorkshire, when I lived up there, especially in the Danby, Egton Bridge area. I'm sure they're just Commons though.

A good rule of thumb in my experience is that Japanese Pheasant is smaller and greener than both "regular" pheasant or the melanistic pheasant types. The melanistic types are usually as large as a regular pheasant and tend to have quite a lot of blue gloss on them, e.g. on the upper breast.

My first encounter with a true Japanese Green Pheasant was one released in Suffolk circa 1975 to introduce fly faster genes into the local pheasant population, Unfortunately it didn't go quite fast enough and was shot that winter. My last encounter was much more satisfactory-sneaked into a bamboo plantation outside Narita airport for a leak and a startled J G Pheasant became last addition to the trip list before departure.
 
I don't know what a Japanese pheasant looks like, but there is a type (breed? not race, I would guess, anyway) that is of a dark purple hue. I saw some in North Yorkshire (the grounds of a castle or big house near Ripon), England, about 15 years ago, and someone has released some here in the Isle of Man more recently; well, one turned up by the road leading to the hospital here.
By the way, I almost typed "deep purple"!
 
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