The Blood Pheasant, Ithaginis cruentus, is the only species in genusIthaginis (Wagler, 1832) of the Pheasant family. It has 15 different subspecies.
This species' name comes from the fact that the males have vivid red coloring on the feathers of the breast, throat and forehead. Females are more uniformily colored with duller shades of reddish brown. Both males and females have a distinct ring of bare skin around the eye that is crimson colored, in addition to red feet. Subspecies are determined by varying amounts of red and black feathers.
The Blood Pheasant lives in the mountains of Nepal, Sikkim, Tibet, northern Burma and the north-west areas of China. The habitat most preferred by Blood Pheasants is coniferous or mixed forests and scrub areas right at the snowline. The pheasants move their range depending on the seasons and during the summer are found at higher elevations. Populations move to lower elevations as the snow increases in the fall and winter. The Blood Pheasant is the state bird of the Indian state of Sikkim.
References
Johnsgard, Paul A. The Pheasants of the World: Biology and Natural History. Washington, D.C: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1999.
Since the reflectance spectra of Corythaeola, Ithaginis, and Jacana show the distinctive fea- tures of the Tauraco spectrum, this strongly in- dicates that their pigments are identical with or similar to turacoverdin.
In Ithaginis, the re- flection of green light from the barbules is in- creased by the presence of air in the barbule cells (Schmidt 1961), which is exceptional as barbule cells are normally solid.
Their ranges are relatively close in Burma, where Ithaginis occurs at high altitudes in mountains in the north, and Rollolus in mature forest in lowland and on hills in the extreme south (Smythies 1953, Medway and Wells 1976).
Blood Pheasant (Ithaginis cruentus), 43 cm for male and 39cm for female.
Crest grey, varying in length according to race; forehead, face, and throat red; breast streaked with red; above grey, the feathers prominently white streaked.
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