Radiotracking of Pheasants (Phasianus colchicus L.): To Test Captive Rearing Technologies

The common pheasant is a species that comes from Asia: its natural geographical distribution includes the central western and eastern areas of Asia, from Caucaso to Formosa island. It has been largely introduced in Europe: in Italy since Roman age, in most of central western and eastern Europe between 500 and 800 B.C.; much later it has been introduced also in North America, Hawaii islands, New Zealand and in many other countries (Cramp & Simmons, 1980; Hill & Robertson, 1988; Johnsgard, 1986). In Italy the populations of pheasant are composed of hybrids coming from subspecies of "Phasianus colchius" part of "colchius" group, "mongolicus" and "torquatus" and from the two subspecieses of "Phasianus versicolor" (Brichetti, 1984). At the present, the nominal subspecies can be considered extinct in Italy: the last stocks, probably extinct or genetically contaminated by captive reared pheasants released for hunting purposes, survived until the end of last century in Tuscany, Basilicata, Calabria and some other small areas of the north Italy. It is difficult to establish the consistency of the Italian population of this species, because its distribution is not known and because generally data density are missing. The Italian population is constituted by more or less isolated sub-populations, preserved in Protected Areas (PA) and in few hunting areas. The groups of animals, which are in free hunting territories, cannot be considered real populations because these groups are not selfsustaining, but they are artificially re-constituted year after year by regular restocking with new pheasants, breeders or young ones, captive reared or wild ones captured in no hunting areas during the winter months (Santilli & Bagliacca, 2008).