Best sleeping arrangements for Golden Pheasant Poults

AbutheRoo · **Posted:** Sun Feb 06, 2011 2:16 pm

We have recently bought five, four week old Golden Pheasant poults. Having admired the breed for ages, my husband is excited to finally own some.

At the moment they're living in the lap of luxury indoors while they feather up completely. We're building a permanent home for them, which will see them with a good sized covered in run adjacent to our chooks. The plan is that they'll eventually free range, learning to come in at night just like our well trained hens (that's what we're hoping anyway). My three week old baby rooster is living happily with the pheasant poults and we plan to keep him with them in their new home. The new run has a dry dirt floor and we'll put in some good sized tree branches for everyone to clamber around on. Do young pheasants roost like chooks, or should we be putting in a 'nest' area of hay etc somewhere on the ground for them?

Really appreciate any help with this question - we want the wee dudes (and dudettes) to be happy. :-D

RPoultry · **Joined:** Thu May 27, 2010 9:40 pm **Posts:** 933

AbutheRoo wrote:

The plan is that they'll eventually free range, learning to come in at night just like our well trained hens (that's what we're hoping anyway).

DO NOT let them out to free range or you will find that at the end of the day you won't have any chicks comming home

AbutheRoo wrote:

My three week old baby rooster is living happily with the pheasant poults and we plan to keep him with them in their new home. The new run has a dry dirt floor and we'll put in some good sized tree branches for everyone to clamber around on.

It may look cute now but after a couple of weeks the rooster will be much larger than the pheasants and will start to pick on them :cry:

, so please for your pheasants sake, take nim out within the next 2-3 weeks. As for the perches yes they do roost like chickens but tend to roost in the open as opposed to the nice dry shelter :roll:

, so try to make sure that most of the perches and the highest perched are in the covered area :-D

AbutheRoo wrote:

Do young pheasants roost like chooks, or should we be putting in a 'nest' area of hay etc somewhere on the ground for them?

[/quote]

I have answered this question in the above statement

AbutheRoo · **Posted:** Sun Feb 06, 2011 6:42 pm

Thanks for your advice Zach, it's much appreciated.

No doubt my young roo will prefer to hang out with the chooks when he gets a little older, will certainly keep an eye on the pheasant/roo relationship over the next few weeks.

Didn't realise that free ranging the golden pheasants (when they're older) would be a huge issue, as the first birds of this breed that we met were happily living in a farm paddock with chooks, guinea fowl and white swans. There wasn't an aviary or enclosure of any sort for them in sight! Plenty of trees and undergrowth to keep them happy though. Maybe this is something that farmers in the deep south of New Zealand can get away with??? I'll have to ask what their secret is.

Cheers & thanks again.

bluepeafowl · **Posted:** Mon Feb 07, 2011 7:40 am

Yes you can free range some pheasants and the red golden pheasant is one of those however be aware it is a risk and they can be taken by predators. If you want to try this it is important you do it the right way. You start by releasing a young cockbird say 6-8 months old that was born on your ranch and do not release a hen these two points are critical if you want to succeed. So to recap

1 - Release a young cockbird say 6-8 months old that was born on your ranch ONLY
2 - Do not release a hen

AbutheRoo · **Posted:** Mon Feb 07, 2011 9:01 am

Thanks Bluepeafowl - we will do exactly what you advise.

As far as predators go, the only potential threat to the pheasants will be the small population of native hawks in our area (peregrines).They tend to keep their distance due to our oversized cats. Luckily the cats have learned that poultry are family, so restrict their hunting to rabbits!

Wyoming · **Joined:** Sun Feb 06, 2011 9:19 pm **Posts:** 12

I got the same advice from bluepeafowl over 2 years ago
I have 3 male reds on our ranch and all are brothers raised together and set free together its now 2 years later and all is well
They spend their days looking at the gals in the pens

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