Silver Pheasant

Silver Pheasant Information

Scientific Information

Class: Aves

Order: Galliformes

Family: Phasianidae

Subfamily: Phasianinae

Genus: Lophura

Species: Lophura nycthemera

Species English Name: Silver Pheasant

Common Name: Silver

CITES Status: Not Listed

IUCN Status: Least Concern

Distribution: Southwestern China, Cambodia, eastern Burma, southern Vietnam, southeastern Thailand, northern Laos, and Hainan

References: William Beebe’s A Monograph of Pheasants Volumes I, II, III, & IV, CITES status search, & IUCN status search.

Description

• Male - White with black barring, black neck, throat, & belly, black crest, red wattles, yellowish-grey beak, and pinkish legs.

• Female - Brown with brownish-grey barring, lighter greyish-brown neck, throat, & belly, darker brown crest, red wattles, yellowish-ivory beak, pinkish legs

• Very hardy birds.

Diet

• We feed our breeders and young adults 17% poultry layer pellets, our tiny chicks 21% poultry starter crumble (fine crumble), and our growing chicks 16% grower crumble (coarser crumble).

• They get a handful of mixed grains every second day during winter. They also get fresh greens (lettuce, chickweed, dandelions, grass) and fruits & vegetables (tomato, grapes, berries, etc.) when available.

Breeding

• Done in pairs or trios.

• Silvers are first year birds. Males do not reach adult plumage until their second year, but they are fertile in their first year.

• They start laying eggs in March and will lay every second day until they lay approximately 20+ eggs.

• They lay a medium sized pinkish-cream egg.

Incubation

• Eggs are collected twice a day and marked with the date and breeding pen number and set daily.

• Eggs are set in an automatic turning Lyons Roll-X (RX2) with grid 89 or a Brinsea Ovation 56 with the standard egg carrier.

• Temperature 99.8°F, humidity-wet bulb 82 with humidity adjusted periodically depending on development of the air space shown by candling

• On the final day of incubation, each egg is placed in its own oval wire mesh hatching basket (6" x 3" x 3") and set in a Roll-X incubator converter to a hatcher.

• Incubation for Silver is 25 days.

• After the chick hatches, it stays in the hatcher for a minimum of 8 hours.

Chicks

• Chicks are golden-brown with black lines and buff underparts.

• They start out in our round 18" brooder pen with a mixed assortment of chicks. After a few days they are separated into a 2' x 4' baby pen for about a week. They are then transferred to a Silver-Swinhoe 2' x 6' pen for the next 7-9 weeks. They stay with this grouping until they go outside. All of these brooding pens have wire bottoms with a heat lamp at one end and feed & water at the other end. The heat lamp is attached to a dimmer switch so we can turn down the amount of heat as the chicks get older until it is turned off completely.

• After they are off of the heat for a few weeks, they are moved outside to the pheasant house (has outside grassy pens and a heated inside house part where hey are blocked in for the night). At this point they are separated into an all Silver pen. After they are toughened up, they are moved to an outside chick pen.

• Chicks are very easy to raise together with their own kind.

Pens

• 25' long x 10' wide x 6' high with a 4' x 4' x 4' house in the middle.

• Pens are covered with 2" diamond top-rite.

• Pens contain grass, which needs to be mowed occasionally because they aren't very big grass eaters.

Behavior

• Are calm and showy birds. The females are avid dusters and like to make well formed deep nests. The males love to display for any one that will watch them and look quite impressive when they are strutting around or beating their wings and flaring their wattles. They are easy to tame down and are a nice hardy bird.

• The cheeky male in the photos on the web site is Sylvester. He was tamed by our oldest Sheltie, Daisy.

Article By Krissy & Donna Bush Pheasant Ridge (updated by Krissy Bird - 2025)