148 MODERN PIG-STICKING 



do not lose their stripes until the end of their third 

 year. My experience, based on the fact of having 

 kept young pig myself, and having seen others 

 reared, enables me to state that the Bengal pig 

 loses his stripes before he is a year old, and often 

 at eight months, when he assumes a brown colour 

 and reaches a height of from 21 inches to 22 inches 

 at the wither. A young boar of eight months, 

 which is in the compound as I write, stands 21 

 inches, and is without the vestige of a stripe. I 

 have known two others about the same size at 

 ten to twelve months. From my personal experience 

 and that of friends, I think I am well on the safe 

 side in saying that by the time a boar is between 

 three and four years old he stands 28 inches to 

 30 inches, and possesses quite a useful pair of tushes, 

 small but sharp, and very punishing. Between the 

 fifth and eighth year he is fully grown and developed, 

 standing anything from 32 inches to 36 inches 

 (occasionally more). His colour, after passing the 

 brown stage, has turned gradually to a dim gray, 

 or slaty black, as the case may be. It is a peculiarity 

 of pig killed in the neighbourhood of Nattore that 

 they have a reddish growth of hair on the throat. 

 Our chur pig are given to eating carrion when 

 obtainable, and have also been known to break up 

 and devour cattle which they have found " ponked " 

 in the deposit of silt left by the inundation. This 

 fact is so well known that Boonas, who are keen on 

 pork, and who are our best beaters, refuse to touch 

 the Moiscoondie pig. 



