[Pseudoscience-is-malarkey (OP)]

Or did it die with Edwardian England? I was looking through a World War One cookbook for the English home-front and I see no mention of it in the recipes. I thought it was plentiful then?

Does it taste like turkey?

[Bored chemist]

Pheasant is still EATEN here.

[alancalverd]

They fly in and roam around my garden until the autumn, when they get slaughtered by local wildlife enthusiasts. I suspect that when the country was on a war footing, the rearing and shooting of pheasants for fun was considered an extravagance of  manual labor and ammunition, both of which were needed to keep the mud churned up in France, or whatever our  grandparents were fighting for.

Not the cheapest of meat but quite delicious and still on the menu at home and in most good restaurants.

[Petrochemicals]

Or did it die with Edwardian England? I was looking through a World War One cookbook for the English home-front and I see no mentions of it. I thought it was plentiful then?

Lol lol lol, pheasant and ww1 homefront are not compatable. Pheasants in the uk are reared and fed in caged enclosures on shoooting estates until shooting season, then let loose and blown to pieces by rich people with posh shotguns dressed in jodpurs, sort of like fox hunting. I believe grouse are still free range, but that too is expensive.

Expensive to do, game poorer people ate ran to rabbits, or halibut monkfish or cod if it came from the seas. 

[evan_au]

When I was living in Belgium, pheasant was available in the supermarket refrigerator.

It looked to me like a slightly larger chicken.

For avoidance of doubt, they left a few long tail feathers on each pheasant so you would know which was which.

[alancalverd]

Shootin' in jods? Chap clearly has no breeding. Tweed and Barbour, for God's sake. And it's gun, not shotgun. The other sort is a rifle. Yes, even in Essex. Grouse are posh, if inedible. For pheasant, you just need to be loaded, but still observe the proprieties, mate, and 'er indoors will cook up a treat.

Thanks to the Common Fisheries Policy, halibut monkfish and cod are strictly for treats these days. There were a few herrings around last year but the North Sea is mostly squid. Even the jellied eel is an endangered species.

[Bored chemist]

When I was living in Belgium, pheasant was available in the supermarket refrigerator.

Ordinarily, it is in the UK too.
https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/duck--game---venison/sainsburys-whole-pheasant--taste-the-difference-500g-6449668-p-44