Do pheasants molt really bad?

BeastyBird · Jun 19, 2016

Everything has been peachy keen with my 14 month old male ring neck pheasant until now, suddenly he is loosing a lot of feathers, his neck looks awful, he eats and acts fine, even still courts his favorite silkie hen, so I am hoping he is just molting. Do pheasants go through a more drastic molt than chickens or does he have a problem? None of my chickens have ever had such patchy feathers.

Tony K T · Jun 19, 2016

Yes they look like crap until their new feathers come in.
In N.H.,Tony.

Midnightman14 · Jun 23, 2016

It depends on the bird too, some birds molt more gracefully than others. Just keep him well fed with good protein rich foods and he'll be fine.

007Sean · Jun 25, 2016

BeastyBird said:
Everything has been peachy keen with my 14 month old male ring neck pheasant until now, suddenly he is loosing a lot of feathers, his neck looks awful, he eats and acts fine, even still courts his favorite silkie hen, so I am hoping he is just molting. Do pheasants go through a more drastic molt than chickens or does he have a problem? None of my chickens have ever had such patchy feathers.

Yep, they can look pretty bad! Here's some pics of mine molting now.