# Im thinking of raising some pheasants



## injunjoe (Aug 19, 2012)

Im looking into raising a few birds to release on my property, if anyone has any tips , tricks or contacts for birds. ( CLARE AREA ). Any info would be greatly appreciated.


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## jafurnier (Jun 7, 2008)

Looks like a royal pain! So, not wanting to knock myself on yet another hobby, I am going to try and buy 8 week old birds. I sent an email to a breeder in Saginaw inquiring about price. I saw some online for $4/bird. Hope the local guys charges those. I'll pay that to avoid the hassles of chicks.

My thought is to build a flight pen and hold the birds in there until I decide they are big enough to release.

My goal is to acutally have some birds living around here...


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## pheasantguy (Jun 21, 2000)

About ten years ago I built a flight pen and raised pheasants. I bought birds at 6-8 weeks of age. I did not release them all at the same time as we only released them prior to hunting. Although I did release a a few at the end of the season a few years. Survival rate is very poor in pen raised birds, less than five percent. I never had any reproduce and the last few years I raised only roosters. I might add the habitat in which they were released was good for pheasants. I started charting my costs a few years back. Excluding the cost of the pen and equipment, my price per bird in 2010 was $12.80. That year I bought seven week old roosters at $5.00 each. That does not include my time but did include fuel cost to pickup birds and feed. In 2011 I bought roosters at 18-20 weeks of age at a cost of $12.50 per bird. If you have the time and enjoy raising the birds and cost isn't your main objective, raise them from 6-8 weeks. Otherwise buy them mature.


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## lastflighttaxidermy (Jul 12, 2010)

We raised em for years when i was younger. Was fun and easy. We would get the chicks in the mail and raise em. Was real easy and fun. We would do put and take with them. Good luck. 

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## kstout (Dec 26, 2005)

I raised them each year for 5 years, got 100 day old chicks. Kept them in a horse trough in the garage for about 2 weeks, with heat lamps on them. By 2 weeks they would fly out of the trough if it wasn't covered. I then moved them into a 20 x 10 pen, with a tarp over the top. kept the heat lamp on them for about another month. I would usually loose 2 to about 10 out of the 100, but once they get to about 2 weeks they were pretty tough. I had to put barn steel around the inside of the pen to keep the ***** from reaching in and killing them. I usually let them go about labor day. I would see them around the neighborhood through the winter, but most never made it after the snow melted. I would find wings, and tails, and piles of feathers where they were eaten by predators. Never did see any of them nesting while doing hay. Many times while I had them in the pen, I would look out and see a redtail hawk perched above the pen. Also trapped many *****, skunks, and possums near the pen. Also had many cars driving by in the fall, and shooting them out the window. Finally after 5 years I gave up on it.


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## MERGANZER (Aug 24, 2006)

If you are doing this for a hobby then great have fun. If you are doing it to increase breeding wild birds then dont waste your money and time. The mortality rate is through the roof and it is tough to get good strong birds. My friend did this for years and the birds just dont make it.

Ganzer


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