10 Miles and Doomed Pheasants

I ran 10 miles this morning and it actually seemed like an almost normal thing to do.

Today was a group run so I got up at 5:00, got ready, and drove down to Ithaca for the 6:15 start. Since not everyone likes to start early, there were two groups this week, a 6:15 one and one at 7:00. Only the coach and one other person, Amy, were there at 6:15 so we headed out. And, since the coach wanted to meet the other group before they started running, he turned back after we'd run the first three miles and Amy and I ran by ourselves for the rest of the route.

Amy told me that she recently ran a half-marathon in 2 hours even so I know I was holding her back but it was good to have company on the long run and made the time go faster. A Great Blue Heron flew overhead at about mile six and I recognized a few patches of Queen of the Prairie (from my own failed attempts to grow it in my own garden) flourishing along the road. I forgot to stop my watch right away when we got back to the parking lot but we finished in about 1 hour and 52 minutes.

Whenever we do group runs of 7 miles or more, we pass by a game farm on the aptly-named Game Farm Road. There are three large fenced enclosures with netting over the top. Two of the enclosures are empty and the third enclosure is filled with pheasants as well as grain bins and water stations for the birds. The enclosures are somewhat overgrown with weeds and grasses so it's almost like the birds are in their own mini-jungle.

Every time we've run by there I've wondered about the pheasants, why they're there and what happens to them so today I googled the game farm. It is called the Richard E. Reynolds Game Farm and is part of a ring-necked pheasant propagation program operated by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

According to the Ring-necked Pheasants in New York pamphlet published in January 2002 by the NY DEC, Reynolds Game Farm has been hatching and distributing pheasants since 1927 and is the only pheasant propagation facility in New York. The farm provides pheasants for three programs: the Day-old Pheasant Chick Program, the Young Pheasant Release Program and the Adult Pheasant Release Program.

If you want to read more specifics about the individual programs, you can take a look at the pamphlet but the last paragraph pretty much sums it up:
"The primary purpose of the pheasant propagation program is to provide pheasant hunting opportunity, not to restore wild pheasant populations. The Department releases thousands of pheasants annually. Very few survive until spring to reproduce. Therefore, hunters are encouraged to harvest released pheasants. All three programs require that the birds are released on land open to public hunting."

Poor pheasants. I feel sad for them.