Birds are not really dumb, they are just domestic. They are basically put out to be killed, usually this happens quick. Many predators come in and kill as many as they can. Back before raptors were protected, we had wild birds that had good survival skills, however when raptor numbers rose, pheasants disappeared, as most small game has. I remember a few years back, a fellow on this site worked hard to get wild pheasants reintroduced here in PA. Despite all the habitat work that was done, and this man claiming that all the wild pheasants needed, was this new great habitat, to survive, the raptors did to these reintroduced birds, what they did to our original wild birds, killed them out of most areas. I remembered being told by this man, how with great habitat, these wild pheasants would be able to survive the uncontrolled numbers of raptors. He had a lot of people fooled for a few years, I talked to the biologist that was involved in the pheasant effort, he was a wise man, and said that the raptors were the main cause of mortality. Kind of like what uncontrolled numbers of wolves did to big game out west, even with good habitat. These domestic pheasants make many people happy, as it gives them a chance to shoot a pheasant. With a dog. these domestic birds can be made to flush, some times they even flush with enough pressure from hunters. This is as close to real pheasant hunting as it will get here, as long as predators, are allowed to hold back small game numbers. At least they are stocking something to shoot, cause small game numbers have been greatly reduced as predator numbers have risen. I remember when I heard about the total protection of raptors, I never believed they could wipe out the abundant small game, but they did. But also seeing them at the same time wipe out most farmers free range small poultry. I believe that in the last few years raptor numbers have leveled off, kind of controlled by the prey numbers. In the spring. the very few small game we have. reproduces, we see large numbers of rabbits and a few other young from other small game. the raptors clean them out by fall hunting season and not much left for human hunters. At this time many raptors migrate south, where some small game are having young, and they feed there. Come spring back they come. Then we have all the ground predators, but most of these can be controlled in numbers. Game management is normally done based on the numbers of the individual animal, when it came to the raptors they were given a blanket political protection, not based on what to do as their numbers rose, protection forever, no matter how many. This is game management based on emotion and not science. So in the end this has led to the abundance of the domestic pheasant and lack of the wild ones.