Gilbert White's 'hybrid pheasant'

[evilsprout]

Came across this in Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne while looking up nightjar stuff earlier.

A Hybrid Pheasant

Lord Stawell sent me from the great lodge in the Hold a curious bird for my inspection. It was found by the spaniels of one of his keepers in the coppice, and shot on the wing. The shape, air, and habit of the bird, and the scarlet ring around the eyes, agreed well with the appearance of the cock pheasant; but then the head and neck, and breast, and belly were of a glossy black: and though it weighed three pounds three ounces and a half, the weight of a full grown cock pheasant, yet there were no signs of any spurs on the legs, as is usual with all grown cock pheasants, who have long ones. The legs and feet were naked of feathers and therefore it could be nothing of the grouse kind. In the tail were no bending feathers such as cock pheasants usually have, and are characteristic of the sex. The tail was much shorter than the tail of a hen pheasant, and blunt and square at the end. The back, wing feathers, and tail, were all of a pale russet, curiously streaked, somewhat like the upper parts of a hen partridge. I returned it with my verdict, that it was probably a spurious or hybrid hen bird, bred between a cock pheasant and some domestic fowl. When I cam to talk with the keeper who brought it, he told me that some pea-hens had been known last summer to haunt the coppices and coverts where this mule was found.

There is a footnote:

N.B. It ought to be mentioned, that some good judges have imagined this bird to have been a stray grouse or blackcock; it is however to be obsverved, that Mr W. remarks, that its legs and feet were naked, whereas those of the grouse are feathered to the toes

The manuscript comments by Mr Markwick say:

Mr Latham observes that 'pea-hens, after they have done laying, sometimes assume the plumage of the male bird', and has given a figure of the male-feathered pea-hen now to be seen in the Leverian Museum; and M. Salerne remarks, that 'the hen pheasant, when she has done laying and Sitting, will get the plumage of the male'. May not this hybrid pheasant (as Mr White calls it) be a bird of this kind? that is, an old hen pheasant which has just begun to assume the plumage of the cock?

So what do any zoologically-mided people out there think White's hybrid pheasant was?

 

[Anonymous]

i think ive seen a white phesant (going under the wheels of the car unfortunatly) but it defenatly wasnt a chicken it looked the same as a normal one but white i just thought they were rare not freakishly rare
casio

i'll keep em peeled for another

 

[Anonymous]

This really has nothing to do with this particular case,but the day before I left for the Navy in 1973,I saw what I'm pretty sure was an albino Ring-necked pheasant hen.This is doubly strange,as I've never heard of anyone ever seeing one,and there used to be a fair number of pheasant hunters around here,including my father.Also,though they tend to be fairly common in several central Indiana counties,they have always been very scarce in my home county.Incidentally,although she ran in front of my car,and I was rather intoxicated at the time,I managed to avoid hitting her.

 

[Anonymous]

the one i saw was near the cricket field at hooten pagnel near doncaster
casio

 

[Anonymous]

I remember seeing a stuffed pheasant/chicken hybrid in a museum as a child, not exactly sure but I think it was either in Scarborough or Whitby (both in North Yorkshire).