File:Reptiles and birds - a popular account of their various orders, with a description of the habits and economy of the most interesting (1883) (14729396476).jpg

Identifier: reptilesbirds00figu (find matches)
Title: Reptiles and birds : a popular account of their various orders, with a description of the habits and economy of the most interesting
Year: 1883 (1880s)
Authors: Figuier, Louis, 1819-1894 Gillmore, Parker
Subjects: Reptiles Birds
Publisher: London : Cassell & Co.

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Fig. 154.—Common Pheasants. ascertained that it also inhabited the whole of the south of Asia—China, Cochin-China, Bengal, &:c. At the present day this bird is found in France, Great Britain,Holland, Germany, and even Sweden. Pheasants prefer wooded slopes or marshy plains. Their foodis of a varied character, and is composed of grain, berries, worms,insects, and snails. They are shy and timid in their nature, takingflight at the slightest indication of danger. They live alone up to
Text Appearing After Image:
THE PHEASANT. 4OI tlie breeding season, when the male birds select their mates, for theyare polygamous. On these occasions they engage in such desperateconflicts that the weaker bird is often killed. Tlie hen Pheasant makes her nest on the ground, in the midst ofa thicket, or in a tuft of grass, and lays from twelve to twenty eggs,which require twenty-four days to hatch. The mother does not manifest that care and solicitude for heryoung which are so marked a characteristic of the majority of otherbirds; she does not even specially recognise her own progeny, forshe pays equal attention to all the young of her race that surroundher. We must not, however, expect to find much maternal love in abird which will break her own eggs to gratify an unnatural appetite. The Pheasant, although wary, is at times unaccountably stupid;thus it falls an easy victim to the poacher. Although they breed in a wild state in our climate, Pheasantsare principally raised in enclosures called pheasantries, where

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