Hume's pheasant

Description

The pheasant of Hume ( Syrmaticus humiae ),also known as Ms.Hume's pheasant or striated-tailed pheasant,is a large forest pheasant,up to 90 cm long,with a grayish-brown head,red bare-faced skin,brown-brown plumage,yellowish beak,brownish orange iris,white helmsman and plumage of the metallic blue neck.The male has a long grayish white tail,with black and brown stripes.The female is brown-brown,with a brown belly and the tip of the white tail. This rare and little known pheasant lives in the forest habitats of China,India,Myanmar and Thailand.The diet consists mainly of plant materials.The female lays three to twelve cream-white eggs in nests of leaves,twigs and feathers. The name commemorates Mary Ann Grindall Hume,wife of the British naturalist in India Allan Octavian Hume. Because of the loss of habitat,the fragmented population and the hunt for its meat,the Hume pheasant is considered almost at risk from the red list of threatened species of IUCN.The CITES places it in Appendix I.