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After a successful squab venture five years ago, Mr. and Mrs. Frank W. Kidney decided to try their hand at rearing pheasants on their Pompey Ridge Farm near Manlius, New York, more as a hobby for Mrs. Kidney than as a business enterprise. By the end of the second year, the project had ceased to qualify as a hobby and had become a paying commercial operation with Mrs. Kidney at the helm.

In 1944, the Kidneys bought 100 pheasant eggs and had them placed in incubators at a commercial hatchery. Of the eighty-two chicks hatched, fifty-seven reached maturity. They altered their system the following year and purchased day-old pheasant chicks instead of eggs, paying between $35 and $50 a hundred. They have continued to start each year's flock with chicks since 1945.

New York's pheasant-hunting season is short, ranging from two to five days a year, depending upon the state conservation department's bird census. The Kidneys' neighbors learned several years ago that buying a brace of dressed and frozen pheasants often is easier and less expensive than hunting the birds in the field. "Home-grown" pheasants soon became a gourmet's favorite among upstate New Yorkers, and the Kidneys were in business.

Mrs. Kidney is responsible for the pheasants, and her husband operates the rest of the 90-acre farm. She raised a flock of 500 Mongolian Ringneck and Mongolian Mutant pheasants last year and marketed them in October and November. Her flock will be even larger this year when rearing facilities are expanded.

A FACTOR making pheasant-rearing profitable is the relatively low mortality in a well-managed flock. Loss before market maturity has not exceeded 15 per cent at Pompey Hill Farm and often runs no higher than 10 or 12 per cent. Highest mortality occurs during the first few days, especially if the chicks come out of the brooder and huddle in groups so they smother. Although mature pheasants are stronger than mature chickens, pheasant chicks are smaller and weaker than ordinary chicks. Pheasants mature faster and begin to feather at three days, while baby chicks' feathers do not appear before ten to fourteen days.

Pheasants make excellent broilers at the age of ten weeks, when they weigh about a pound and a half, according to Mrs. Kidney, but she has not yet marketed the younger birds on a large scale. They are considered a delicacy by those who have tried them, and she plans to feature pheasant broilers this year.

Mrs. Kidney begins marketing her birds when they approach five months of age. They are selected in small groups over a period of six weeks when they are in prime condition, usually in mid-October and early November. At maturity, cocks weigh from three to three and a half pounds and hens from two to two and a half pounds, fully dressed.

The birds are taken to a local frozen food firm where they are killed, New York dressed, and held for twenty-four hours at a temperature of 40 degrees. Then they are completely dressed, wrapped in sheets of aluminum foil, and sharp-frozen.

SPECIAL containers for the pheasants were designed for Mrs. Kidney by a former classmate who attended the School of Art at Syracuse University. The heavy paper cartons are made with transparent windows in the tops. The bid for eye appeal is continued by setting the birds among pine and cedar boughs and adding colorful shredded tissue paper.

Mrs. Kidney also encloses a lithographed page of suggested methods for preparing pheasants. She recommends roasting the birds and serving them with a wild rice dressing.

The Pompey Ridge Farm pheasants are sold only in braces, two birds serving from six to eight persons. The Kidneys do all their own selling, largely to individuals for home servings as a delicacy for special occasions. Dressed and frozen, their pheasants will keep indefinitely under proper refrigeration. The birds remain at the frozen food locker until they are sold, and Mrs. Kidney delivers them or arranges to have them shipped in dry ice.

Last year, Mrs. Kidney sold her flock at $9 a brace, and she describes the venture as "highly profitable." Her profit is narrow now only because she is re-investing proceeds in the project to enlarge facilities and raise a larger flock this year.

She has used several publications as guides in her five-year-old business. Most used is Thomas Rae's "Profitable Game Management," published by a New York milling concern. She also makes extensive use of pamphlets and bulletins issued by the state conservation department's bureau of game.

POMPEY RIDGE Farm operates under a special license granted by the state conservation department. A numbered tag is attached to each pheasant before it leaves the farm. The tags are sold by the state and are required by the conservation department. Mrs. Kidney also must keep detailed records and submit reports to the state annually on the number of chicks purchased, reared, and marketed. Her ledger must contain the name and address of anyone who purchases her birds. The report must tell where she bought her chicks and must show any mortalities which occurred in her flock.

Until recently, the Kidneys had a pointer, the kind of a dog sportsmen say they have once in a lifetime. Before the mesh skirt was added to the bottom of their pheasant pens, "Queenie" wandered around under the wire, paying no attention to the birds. In the brush, however, she would locate any bird within range and hold it until it was flushed.

One day two years ago, Mr. and Mrs. Kidney got their signals crossed, and ten pheasants escaped from the pens and headed for nearby cover. Over a period of two weeks, "Queenie" located every one and held it on point until it was captured by hand and returned to the farm.