Pheasant hybrids known to ornithologists- and few still unknown

[SarahRackowski]

I have 22 that are not even on Johnsgards chart

got photos? I would love to see em'!

 

[nicalandia]

I have 22 that are not even on Johnsgards chart

What are they?

 

[JacinLarkwell]

How doyou breed these? Just through AI or complicated science stuff?

 

[SarahRackowski]

How doyou breed these? Just through AI or complicated science stuff?

Depending on the species, it's not too hard, and hybrids can be produced without the aid of AI!
With some species, such as the golden pheasant and lady Amherst's pheasant, the females are almost identical. Males will display to any female that looks like a member of its own species, and therefore, hybrids are created rather regularly.
this can be easily explained via a case of misidentification on the part of the male, and the possible forced copulation, or a-typical mate choice of the female.
Cases of hybridization in-between less visually similar species, such as silver pheasants and almost any other species, are a little more mysterious, while we know how they happen, why is more of a mystery. A male silver pheasant is unlikely to mistake the hen of any other species for a distinctively shaped and plumaged silver hen, but yet when silvers and other pheasants are kept, hybridization can still happen.
The "complicated science stuff that" comes in here is what all of this hybridizing means for our modern understanding of species ( why I am interested in pheasant hybrids!).
As any high school biology class will tell you (at least with the current U.S common curriculum), a species is supposedly defined by what is known as the biological species concept. the biological species concept is the most commonly used metric for determining if groups of organisms form a species. The BSC states that a species is "a group of organisms that can all interbreed and produce fertile, viable offspring". As you can probably tell, the existence of fertile pheasant hybrids, and even surviving pheasant hybrids at all, call the definition of different pheasant species into question.
For instance, if we take a look at Johnsgard's chart, the biological species concept would tell us that any pair of "species" that can produce fertile offspring are not different species at all. however, if we look at some of the pairs that produce such special offspring in the chart, it is clear that from the physical structure (the morphological species concept) and in some cases genetic variance, that these birds are not, of what we would call the same species (think of the blue and green peafowl, white and gray eared pheasant, and red and gray junglefowl)
this, thus presents us with a dilemma, do we make phenotypical very different birds like the white and gray eared pheasants members of the same species, or do we change our view of the biological species concept?

 

[wildlifeartist1]

Have you looked on here the Hybrid Pheasant page
I have many pics of them.

 

[mstricer]

The Dodo was killed by overhunting.

Today's commonly kept pheasant species, Ringneck, Lady Amherst, Red Golden, Reeves, are legally and scientifically domestic, even though Ringneck do fall under gamebird protections in many areas they have been introduced. In their native areas, all of these species are listed as "least concern". Their non-native areas are legion and historic. There are records of Marco Polo bringing them from the Orient, where they'd been commonly kept for centuries. (His books are fascinating. And your birds may well descend from ones he brought) There are even older records of Romans bringing them to Britain in the 10th century.

In other words, chill.

Now, there's an awful lot in the way of day to day about these birds I don't know. Like, I can't tell one kind of chick or egg from another. BUT, as far as the history of agriculture and commonly kept species, historically significant breeds and agricultural practices and changes through the years, my knowledge is thorough. It's literally my job (agritourism and education), my hobby and my preferred area of study. Hybridization hasn't made any species of pheasant extinct in a thousand years and isn't going to now.

So true. A lot of people don't know you have to have a permit to sell them in some states, Ohio is one of them

 

[lost-duckling]

I theorize that testosterone implants on Hybrid males will produce males that are sexually active and even may promote spermatogenesis

similar with ligers they are very low T so generally classified as sterile but they are not entirely so.