I have been raising pheasants now for 10 years and have never seen this. I have had the same breeding pair for 3 years and have had on the average 20 peeps hatch per year all normal coloration. This time she hatched out 5 peeps 3 of normal color and 2 black ones with white rings around there neck already and they have brown wings tipped in white. There is no way anouther bird could have bred her, does anybody have any ideas what happened, and I wonder what they will look like when they mature? I have kidnapped them and will be raising them in my shop for a while. They might be for sale next fall! Thanks, Dave
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What you have are chicks that carry the melanistic mutation gene. I've raised pheasants for years and have had plenty of melanistics come from "standard ringnecks". The melanistics are actually ringnecks but with more melanism in their feathering. Either your hen or rooster is probably carrying a gene for melanism aquired from a parent bird somewhere in it's lineage. It's not really a unique bird since tens of thousands are raised annually. My guess is that if the chick is a hen, she will look like a chocolate colored ringneck hen and if its a rooster it could vary considerably, and either have a white neck ring, partial ring or no ring at all.
Wil, In 10 yrs. I have never had this happen.