524 Great and Small Game of Africa 



The Algerian boar is often a little darker than the French one ; the 

 snout seems to be a trifle longer, and its hair is neither so full nor so long 

 as is the case with the French boar. These are the only differences I could 

 detect after seeing a great many examples of both these wild swine. 



I have often heard people say that in Algeria the boars were small and 

 had big tusks. This is by no means my experience. It sometimes happens 

 that when one goes shooting without taking any special trouble to find 

 heavy boars, one comes across sounders of hogs. These are young ones 

 as a rule, and hardly over 120 or 130 lbs. weight. But if trouble is taken, 

 and one goes to the right places, the big boars will be found surely 

 enough. What I call a big boar is anything over 200 lbs. clean. I saw them 

 often over 250 lbs., and shot one weighing 275 lbs. They rarely stand 

 over 35 or 38 inches high, 33 inches being about the average. As for 

 the tushes, they are very like those of the French boar ; 2 inches showing 

 out of the gum is not a bad sample ; 3 inches is very rare. Any tusk 

 measuring more than 8 inches over the outside curve is good. The length 

 of the tush is not always found corresponding to the size of the boar, 

 and I often saw big hogs with small tushes, and small ones with large 

 tushes. 



In Algeria the wild boar is to be found in every place where forest or 

 brushwood abounds. The jungle is very thick, and these animals seldom 

 leave it except at night. Sometimes one may see them at early morning, 

 or just before dark, in the clearings or on the outskirts of the forest. 

 They love the thickest and the coolest places, and often wallow in the 

 mud. In the daytime, unless there be heavy rain, they lie up and 

 seldom move. 



Often eight, or even ten, hogs are born at a litter, nearly always in a 

 dry place near to water. The young are striped at first. By the time 

 they have grown to 20 lbs. weight they are brown in colour, and when 

 more than 50 lbs. is attained they turn black. The hogs of one litter 



