Sapphire-breasted Pheasant
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Sapphire-breasted
Pheasant, Phasicarunculus
sapphyrus L 60-90 cm, WS 60-80 cm, Family:
Phasianidae
Description:
Large
chicken-like bird with plump body, long legs, small head, and long, pointed
tail. Males are intricately patterned with a deep blue iridescent head, breast,
and upper back with large, red skin wattles on face that extend upwards like
“horns” and hang down the sides of the face. Lower back reddish with single
white bar. Belly rust colored, with black spotting, the long tail is rust-brown
with narrow black striping and long, gray feathers with narrow barring extend
past rump. Males have spurs on legs. Females brown, with paler scaling overall
and short tail with narrower striping. Females lack spurs, and face wattles
small, pale. Single white bar on back and more extensive blue coloring help
distinguish it from similar Scaled Pheasant.
Voice:
Males
“crow” around dawn and dusk at all times of year, similar to crowing of a
domestic rooster only shorter, simpler. Crowing is raspier and patterned
differently than Scaled Pheasants’s and can be heard up to a mile away. Males
will also make drumming sounds by beating their wings and a flutter sound by
vibrating tail feathers. Both sexes give a three-note call when they flush,
raspier than Scaled Pheasant calls. Female gives special “mumble” calls when
interacting with chicks. Other various calls given associated with flight and
alarm.
Range and Habitat:
Uncommon,
range extends throughout western Novasola, not seen east of the divide. Found
in most western forest types, including temperate rainforest, subalpine,
lowland, conifer and mixed conifer-deciduous forests, but prefers more open or
sparse woods, forest edges, meadows, clear-cuts and wetlands. Typically avoids
altitudes higher than 7,000 feet. Range and habitat preferences help separate
Scaled and Sapphire-breasted Pheasants. Sapphire-breasted Pheasants have been
introduced to many places as a game bird, including parts of mainland North
America, Europe, and Australia, but to a lesser extent and less successfully
than the Scaled Pheasant.
Discussion:
Similar
to, and almost as popular as, the Scaled Pheasant of the east, the brilliant Sapphire-breasted
Pheasant is a staple upland gamebird on Novasola. Uncommon and elusive, this
pheasant can be difficult to find in the dark conifer forests of western
Novasola. They prefer to remain on the ground, hidden in vegetation, usually
taking flight only when a potential threat has approached within five to ten
meters. Their plumage of glossy blues and reds and intricate spotting and
barring, though attractive, provides sufficient camouflage, thus outside of
hunting most encounters with the Sapphire-breasted Pheasant occur along
roadsides as they attempt to cross, or during the breeding season when males
strut out in the open.
Like
Scaled Pheasants, the Sapphire-breasted engage in harem breeding, where one
male will establish a territory and breed with and protect a number of females.
He will defend his harem and territory from other males aggressively by cawing,
calling, threat displays, and, rarely, fighting. Sapphire-breasted Pheasants
are more secretive and quieter than their eastern cousins, so males call less
frequently. During courtship, the male will display for the female by strutting
and spreading his wings and tail feathers, and well as wing drumming and fast
fluttering and vibrating of tail feathers. After copulation the female will
build a rudimentary nest under dense cover to lay her eggs. Males take no part
in caring for offspring.
The
Sapphire-breasted Pheasant’s diet consists mostly of seeds, grains, nuts,
roots, fruits, grasses, and leaves, as well as eggs and invertebrates. Invertebrates
and other animal prey like earthworms, beetles, millipedes, spiders, snails,
and bird eggs make up more of their diet than in Scaled Pheasants and they will
even hunt small reptiles and amphibians when desperate. They use their strong
legs and toes to scratch and dig the ground while foraging and can reach roots
as deep as four inches into the soil.
Sapphire-breasted
Pheasants are an incredibly popular bird among hunters, as they are challenging
and beautiful trophies. Their preference for more wooded habitat and their
lower population numbers make them much more difficult, and thus less popular,
to hunt than Scaled Pheasants, but they still hold a lofty spot near the top of
most unofficial popularity contests. Despite hunters killing large numbers of
birds each year, effective management practices ensure the overall population
is minimally affected, and in fact the bird’s population seems to have
increased over the years, quite rare for endemic birds, as more areas have been
cleared by logging which has created more clearings and edge habitat. However,
as the pheasant’s population has grown and spread to new areas, more and more birds
are killed by automotive strikes, logging machinery, and hunting, which have caused
some conservationists and ecologists to call for stronger restrictions and protections.
The
Sapphire-breasted Pheasant is a colorful, if not elusive, western equivalent to
the Scaled Pheasant of the east; the two birds share many similarities and were
at one point considered the same species. It is now believed that they are
distinct enough to warrant separate classifications, and like many Novasolan
birds it seems geographic isolation caused by the interior mountains drove this
speciation. The two pheasants comprise the genus Phasicarunculus, found
only on Novasola. The genus name comes from the Latin for “Wattled Pheasant”,
for the large and elaborate facial wattles found on the males of both species.
The genus’ evolutionary history is contentious, but recent studies suggest Phasicarunculus
is most closely related to the Asian “Long-tailed Pheasants” of the genus Syrmaticus
found across eastern Asia. The Cishtaklun name for the bird is akooxidaq,
similar to words used by other tribes to mean the Scaled Pheasant, as most
native languages would use the same name for one or the other, as most tribal
lands overlapped with one bird’s range or the other. They are both important
birds culturally, as many tribes use pheasant feathers in ritual and
decoration.
Novasola
is well known for its many unique and fascinating gamebirds, of which the
Sapphire-breasted Pheasant is a stunning example. It is an important animal to
most western Novasolan indigenous groups, who use their feathers in cultural
practices, and was immediately popular with European colonizers, for whom it
quickly became a staple food source and sport. In fact, this was one of the endemic
birds on Novasola to already have been described scientifically prior to the
Novasolan Research Expedition.
“The
Sapphire-breasted Pheasant is occidental in distribution, with the great
montane divide serving as the eastern extent of its range, and can be found
inhabiting nearly all forests within that range. Generally a secretive
creature, the pheasant hides away under the cover of evergreens, content that
its appearance might be descried and beheld by its kind only. Unfortunately so,
as the male Sapphire-breasted Pheasant, as with so many birds on this island of
living jewels, stuns any fortunate observer with its gorgeous hues and reminds
all of the true beauty, true majesty, of the Fastwater wild country.
…
There
is a marked difference in the physicality and nature of the sexes. While the
male is ornately decorated in vibrant hues and willing to flaunt himself in the
face of competition or threat, the female is cryptic, patterned in varied
shades of brown, clandestine, comfortable more under the concealing shadows of
shrubbery. This drabness and secrecy afford her nest and her offspring a level
of safety and parentage the males neither could nor would provide. The
Sapphire-breast makes for a diligent mother but an absent father. Males focus
instead on defending territories from intruders and, during the breeding months,
defending harems from would-be suitors eager to usurp the male’s hard-fought
reproductive privileges.
Indeed
it is during this breeding that one might have the highest odds of success in
observing these fowl, when adults have yet to lay eggs. Flocks of anywhere
between three and eleven birds will congregate in the more open spaces of the
male’s range as he swaggers pompously about, brandishing his illustrious fashion,
crowing at regular intervals hoping to discourage challenges. Their courtship
displays are frequent and a treat to behold. Once fertilized, the females will
depart the group to build a nest of sorts and rear offspring, who are born
roughly a fortnight from laying ready to immediately leave the nest with the
mother in search of food.” – Native Birds of Novasola, 1912
“Excitement today! For the first time in eight days, which felt like an unbearable eternity, we have enjoyed meat. I am comfortable speaking for the entire Corps when I say No More Fish! The Salmon Diet, as a few of us have begun to call this week past, has come to a hopeful permanent conclusion this afternoon when our scouting party returned with an ample haul of game fowl. Never have I been so thankful for a poorly dressed pheasant. What’s more, Mr. Reichwald has assured me we have entered new country he states will be brimming with fowl. I should be a fool not to believe him, as this evening already I have witness such proof as a bright blue male pheasant bound across the open ground of the woodlands just outside camp.” – NRC member Alec Ovid Peterson, Expedition log, September 19, 1903