Pheasant season in Pennsylvania nears liftoff
HARRISBURG – Break out the brush pants, your favorite shotgun and, of course, a fluorescent orange hat and vest. Pennsylvania’s pheasant season is winging its way closer.
Saturday marked the start of the junior pheasant season, and the statewide season follows close behind, opening Saturday, Oct. 24.
Pennsylvania’s pheasant hunters this year will enjoy expanded hunting dates, with all 21 Sundays falling within the season now open (up from 6 open Sundays during the 2025-26 season). In addition, pheasant hunting will remain open during the overlap with the statewide firearms deer season, providing an additional two weeks of opportunity.
All told, the Game Commission plans to stock approximately 232,000 birds incrementally through early January, with most releases occurring on public land.
About 17,000 pheasants will go out for the junior pheasant hunt, open to all junior hunters and mentored hunters of any age. The junior season runs from Oct. 10-18. Visit www.pa.gov/pgc for junior season stocking locations.
“Pheasant releases will occur weekly from late October through late November,” said Ian Gregg, chief of the Game Commission’s Wildlife Operations Division. “A mid-December release will bolster hunting opportunity prior to the holidays, and many sites are also scheduled to be stocked twice shortly after Christmas for late season hunting. Results from last year’s game farm pheasant harvest rate study indicated that these post-Christmas releases, initiated in 2021-22, are well-used by hunters and should be continued.”
Gregg noted that a mid-February stocking is also tentatively planned, provided that the primary breeder flocks at the agency’s chick supplier remain healthy through mid-winter. A final decision will be made and communicated in early February.
Pheasant hunting is open statewide, except in Pennsylvania’s two Wild Pheasant Recovery Areas – the Central Susquehanna WPRA in Northumberland and Montour counties, and the Franklin WPRA in Franklin County. No pheasant season will occur in either WPRA this year.
Elsewhere in the state, hunters may harvest either male or female pheasants. Both are released by the Game Commission, at a ratio of about three males for every female.
Although protecting hens is an important aspect of wild pheasant management, survival of propagated pheasants is too low to support sustainable populations, even without hunting mortality. Therefore, hunters are encouraged to take advantage of opportunities to harvest hens.
Each pheasant hunter needs a general hunting license, and most hunters need a pheasant permit, as well. Pheasant hunters must, at all times, wear at least 250 square inches of fluorescent orange on the head, chest and back combined. A fluorescent orange hat and vest will satisfy this requirement.
Hunters must abide by a two-pheasant daily limit and six-pheasant possession limit.
All adult hunters and some senior hunters who pursue pheasants are required to purchase a pheasant permit in addition to a general hunting license. The permit costs $26.97 and is available through HuntFishPA or from any license issuing agent.
As with a general hunting license, hunters can store a digital pheasant permit on a smart device to carry when hunting. Paper licenses and permits must be signed when carried afield.
Senior lifetime resident license holders who acquired their licenses prior to May 13, 2017 are exempt from needing a pheasant permit.
Junior hunters and mentored permit holders under 17 need a free permit.
Although pheasant-permit revenue is not earmarked specifically for the propagation program, and does not completely offset the costs of raising and stocking pheasants, it is important in ensuring the financial sustainability of the program. Permit revenue for the 2025-26 license year was over $1.5 million.
“Over 75,000 pheasant permits are issued each year, and the fact that recent sales trends have been stable to slightly increasing seems to indicate Pennsylvania pheasant hunters are finding good value in the expanded winter releases and other aspects of the Game Commission’s pheasant propagation and stocking program,” Gregg said. “The nearly 30 additional pheasant hunting days on the 2026-27 calendar will further increase the return on their permit investments.”
Because pheasant hunting in Pennsylvania relies on the release of propagated birds, hunters are wise to focus their efforts on the time periods and locations where the Game Commission stocks birds.