Most people look at a pheasant and think “wild bird” or “game bird.” But these native Asian birds can also make excellent pets, and most of the time, they are no more difficult to take care of than chickens. Pheasants are quite smart too, and their feathers are beautiful to look at.
Maybe you’re considering having a few of your own (they are social creatures, so it’s best to get more than one), but you don’t know which ones to pick. Check out this list of different types of pheasants, and hopefully, it will help you come to a decision!
Top 6 Types of Pheasants
1. Common (Ring-Necked) Pheasant
As the name suggests, these pheasants, also known as ring-necked pheasants, are the most common ones seen in North America. Female common pheasants are usually plain brown, while the male version is known for having vibrant blue/green head and white neck rings. Sometimes, the males can take on all-white or all-black colors.
Common pheasants are the world’s most hunted birds.1 They prefer to live in fields, farmlands, and places with lots of brush. Sometimes, they also inhabit the woods and wet, marshy lands. Common pheasants only take flight when they need to, as they like to stay on the ground and search for and eat grains, berries, insects, seeds, and small animals.
2. Golden Pheasant
The male golden pheasant is one of nature’s most grand displays of art. Its feathers are bright yellow, red, black, and green. These birds are native to the forests in the Western and Central Chinese mountain regions, which is why they are also called Chinese pheasants.
Golden pheasants are unique because of their “ruffles.” They are one of two pheasant breeds to possess this feature, which flares across their faces and necks during mating rituals. As with other pheasant breeds and birds in general, female golden pheasants are less colorful, with a light brown face, brown plumage, and a smaller figure.
These pheasants eat invertebrates, grubs, grains, berries, seeds, and other types of vegetation.
3. Silver Pheasant
Native birds to Southeast Asia (Burma, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand) and Southern and Eastern China, the silver pheasants are among the most popular types of pheasant. They can also be spotted in the Hawaiian Islands and the mainland United States. These pheasants weigh slightly more than many others, making them hardier in harsh conditions.
The male version of this species differs within the subspecies, but all have plentiful white and black feathers in common, with bluish-black feathers underneath and red wattles. Females are all brownish-black, with shorter tail feathers and a red outline around their eyes.
You might find a silver pheasant in wild, high-altitude forests. These pheasants forage for not only seeds and plants but also insects and worms.
4. Lady Amherst’s Pheasant
The second of the “ruffed pheasants” on this list, Lady Amherst’s pheasant is another looker. It sports a similar feather pattern as the golden pheasant but with parrot-like colors of reddish-orange, green, blue, yellow, white, and black. Female Lady Amhersts look more camouflaged, with light, medium, and dark brown-patterned feathers, similar to those of the female common pheasant.
Lady Amherst was the wife of the General of Bengal in the early 1800s, and she was responsible for bringing the species from the China/Myanmar area to London. Since then, a population of these pheasants has been maintained in London, but it has dwindled over time.
Lady Amhersts are unique in that the male pheasants sometimes help look after the young. These birds prefer dense and dark forests for their habitat.
5. Reeves’s Pheasant
Reeves’s pheasant is native to Central and East China, but they have been introduced in areas like the United States, Czech Republic, France, and the U.K. The most notable thing about this pheasant is its long tail. The tail and bird together measure about 2 meters long, making it the longest tail among all birds in the world.
Male and female Reeves’s pheasants look similar, in contrast to other pheasant breeds. They have colorful golden, black, and brown-patterned feathers, with the male donning a whitish-black head.
This bird is named after John Reeves, a British naturalist who brought the bird to Europe in 1831.
6. Mikado Pheasant
The last pheasant on this list is the beautiful Mikado pheasant. It’s native to the Central Taiwan mountains and is unofficially the nation’s national bird, featured on the Taiwanese dollar. The Taiwanese refer to this bird as the “king of the mist.”
The male Mikado pheasant is dark-colored in the shade but shines blue or purple in the sunlight. It also has a white-striped tail and red wattles. Females are olive-brown with a duller red wattle, and both sexes have grey legs.
This species prefers to live in bamboo growth, dense shrubs, and grassy areas with conifer trees. Mikado pheasants are foragers of fruit, vegetation, invertebrates, leaves, and seeds, and they tend to do this on rainy or foggy days.
Pheasant FAQ
How Many Kinds of Pheasants Are There?
There are 50 species of pheasants and 16 subspecies. This article only covered six different kinds of pheasants, but there are also peacock pheasants, tragopans, and monals.
How Far Can Pheasants Fly?
When they must, the common pheasant can fly from 150 feet to about a mile at most. Their flight speed is around 30 mph normally, but when they are startled into flight, they can fly up to speeds of 50 mph. However, pheasants usually prefer running over flying.
Are Pheasants Related to Pigeons or Peacocks?
Pheasants and peacocks are in the same family of birds called Phasianidae, which also includes birds like chickens, partridges, turkeys, and grouse. The peacock and the pheasant live in different parts of the world and are different in their size and color. They are related, but they are not entirely identical. There’s also a third related species within Phasianidae called peacock-pheasants, which are not genetically related to pheasants and only distantly related to peacocks.
Pigeons and pheasants are not in the same scientific family. Pigeons can fly much farther and are much smaller than pheasants. Perhaps confusingly, the pheasant pigeon is a species of pigeon from New Guinea that has the same markings and colorings as a pheasant and the same ground-dwelling tendencies.
Final Thoughts
Whether you want pheasants for game meat, eggs, or just visual appeal, we hope that we have helped you explore the pheasant world. When you decide to buy one, you can probably find pheasants at your local farm store or hatchery. Keeping pheasants as pets is sure to fascinate you from day one.
- See also: Can Pet Snakes Eat Eggs?
Featured Image Credit: Pixabay
