pheasant rearing

springer lad

hey,was wantin some information on rearing pheasants.i have finished building a pen of about 60 sq yards.where can i get week or two week old pheasants?what is the stocking rate in the pen and will i have to buy any medication durin the five or six weeks they are in the pen?

homerhop

We used to use a rule of thumb of 1sq yard per bird. I dont know about getting birds that young, We used to get 6 week old polts. You will have to treat the birds for gape worm, you put the medication in their drinking water. You will also have to keep a check on birds pecking at one and other, you will notice this when birds are bleeding from under their tail feathers.

LOUTHSHOOTER

springer lad wrote: »

hey,was wantin some information on rearing pheasants.i have finished building a pen of about 60 sq yards.where can i get week or two week old pheasants?what is the stocking rate in the pen and will i have to buy any medication durin the five or six weeks they are in the pen?

There is always plenty of adds in the Irish shooters digest for pheasants.Might be worth a look

pullandbang

The jury is still out on rearing young birds.

Over the years we have reared all our birds from 6 week olds.
We've let out only adults.
We've done a combination of both - six week olds and adults.

At times, all have been successful and all have been crap! It depends on a lot of factors - the weather, the vermin, the predator control, the committment of the club members. If everything goes to plan then young birds are a great success and you get great satisfaction from rearing them.
However, things can go wrong like in 2008 when in one club we lost 90% of our birds to floods. The pen flooded in an area that hasn't flooded in living memory!

Some people swear by adult birds only, while others swear by young chicks......it's a lot of trial and error!