State Ready To Turn Loose Pen-Raised Pheasants Again

Many years ago, when my son, John, was starting to hunt, I took him to a pheasant release area just north of Coffeepot Lake.

I wanted to make sure John, then about 14, had a chance of shooting a rooster or two. Pen-raised roosters, I knew, were virtually incapable of eluding hunters and their dogs. Wild birds, on the other hand, were elusive and frustrating. They ran and flushed out of gun range.

The Fish and Game Department had released about 75 roosters in the fields the previous evening. Twenty to 30 meat hunters, who knew the birds had been released, were tromping around in the high grass. Periodically, a confused bird would start to fly from under a hunter’s feet and would die immediately.

John and I started walking through the grass, my pointer just ahead of us. When the dog pointed a bird, we moved up. The rooster didn’t want to fly. I kicked it out. Overweight, it lumbered slowly out of the grass. John didn’t fire.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said to me. “This is like shooting chickens in a barnyard. I don’t want to shoot such dumb birds.”

We left. I’ve never forgotten his reaction to the birds’ vulnerability. Already, without really knowing it, he sensed that shooting game-farm-reared pheasants a few hours after they had been released violated the fundamental rule of fair chase. I was proud of him.

To him, shooting near-helpless pheasants was much like ground sluicing quail, shooting sitting ducks and geese or spotlighting deer.

Now, after several years of not releasing pen-reared roosters in Eastern Washington, the Fish and Wildlife Department this fall will release 13,000 confused birds. Officials aren’t eager to do so. The state Legislature, during the dying moments of its 1997 session, passed a law requiring the agency to sell $10 “pheasant enhancement” stamps and to use 80 percent of the money raised to release birds.

FWD officials believe pheasant hunters will spend a total of $300,000 this fall for the $10 stamp. Every hunter, including those opposed to the release of penraised birds and who would be embarrassed to be seen at a release site, must buy the stamp.

The only good thing about the new law is that about $100,000 can be used this year and next for habitat enhancements on Eastern Washington lands.

The FWD will buy adult birds from private game farms at a cost of $10 to $15 per rooster and release them on public land, including the Sherman Creek Wildlife Area, BLM property near Fishtrap Lake, the Corps of Engineers sites along the Snake River and a dozen sites in the Columbia Basin and the Yakima region.

FWD officials, who were shocked to learn that 80 percent of the money raised by sale of the $10 stamps had to be spent on a costly pheasant release program, quickly discovered that private game farms weren’t geared up to produce large numbers of adult roosters for release this fall. However, they’ve managed to contract for 13,000 birds.

Now they’re making plans to try to persuade the next Legislature to change the law so all the money raised by sale of the stamps be spent on habitat improvement or the 80-20 percent ratio be reversed, with only 20 percent of the money to be spent on a pheasant release program.

Quietly and without asking for hunters’ opinions, Washington stopped releasing game-farm-raised roosters in Eastern Washington 15 years ago and closed its Deer Park and Walla Walla game farms.

The agency stopped raising and releasing pheasants because the program was a waste of money. Most conscientious hunters thought it justified the killing of near-helpless birds and was just an opportunity for a few hundred hunters to take home meat.

Pen-reared pheasants are not prepared to elude predators and they cower in cover when hunters approach. If they are released more than a day before hunters go after them, most will be killed by coyotes, feral house cats and hawks.

In a way, it’s unfortunate the FWD will release roosters just before a special hunt for juvenile hunters 15 years of age and under. The juveniles will be allowed to kill pheasants Sept. 27 and 28.

Most youngsters, knowing the hunt is promoted by the wildlife agency, won’t realize that killing birds that haven’t learned to take care of themselves is unfair to the birds. Some, like my son John, will feel sorry for the roosters and stop hunting.

John and I never hunted game-farm birds again. For years, he followed me around the Palouse hills; now, I follow him as his legs, strengthened by climbing the world’s highest peaks, take him up and down steep canyons at a pace too fast for me to keep up with.

, DataTimes MEMO: You can contact Fenton Roskelley by voice mail at 459-5577, extension 3814.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Fenton Roskelley The Spokesman-Review