Flight characteristics, hunter selection and morphometrics of reared pheasants (Phasianus colchicus) in England.

Abstract

The pheasant, Phasianus colchicus, is the most widely hunted gamebird in the United Kingdom. This is due in a large part to the extensive rearing and release of pheasants. In recent years there has been concern that the flying ability of pheasants during driven shoots has deteriorated. We studied hunter choice for shooting reared pheasants and relationship to measures of flight performance. In 1993-1994, we observed flight parameters of 1,314 pheasants on 106 drives from 24 estates in England, and we collected an additional sample of 206 pheasants for carcass analysis. Hunters selected those birds with greater take-off angle (P < 0.001) and flapping time (p = 0.02). We found no relationship between take-off angle with proportion of birds shot at and missed (p = 0.17). Perception of 'quality' increased with increasing mean take-off angle for each drive (P < 0.001), but not with increasing flap time (p = 0.29). We found that both drive within an estate (P < 0.001) and between estate differences (P < 0.001) were the most important factors affecting both take-off angle and flapping time of pheasants. Take-off angle and flapping time were positively correlated (P < 0.001). Neither land contour (p = 0.40), nor number of birds flushed (p = 0.24) appeared to influence take-off angle. However, as the number of birds flushed increased, flapping time decreased (p = 0.06), but contour was not important (p = 0.18). We found no morphological variables that could explain differences in take-off angle or flapping time. However, we found differences between estates in tarsus length as an index of size (p = 0.04), body weight (P < 0.001), and fat level (p = 0.02), but none of these variables were different among drives within estates. Flight performance appears to be more related to characteristics of individual pheasant drives and hunter perception rather than inherent morphological differences among the birds.