Description

Distinguishing Features - The Ring-necked Pheasant is unlike in appearance with any other game bird in the world. The colourful male with a 40 - 45 cm long tapered tail, a rooster-like bill and spurred tarsus is a striking bird. The white ring around the neck varies in depth and is sometimes lacking. Females are quite different with dark spotted, pale-brownish overall colouration.

Habitat

A native from the Ukraine, east to central Asia to Manchuria and southern China; introduced and widely established in Europe, the United States and southern Canada. It prefers farmland with fields of grain near shrub cover, woodland and marsh edges.

Diet

Primarily grains, seeds, berries; also insects.

Notes

Populations introduced from several sub-species are now mingled and composite in this species only.

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