852 



The Lincolnshire Curly Coated Pig. 



[July, 



THE LINCOLNSHIRE CURLY COATED 



PIG. 



Sanders Spencer. 



There appears to be little doubt as to the locality in which 

 the Lincolnshire Curly Coated Pig originated, since in no other 

 county than Lincolnshire is there found a breed of pig of a 

 similar type and character. It is true that some forty or fifty 

 years ago there was to be found in County Cork an occasional 

 pig with very curly hair, but this was of quite a different charac- 

 ter to the curly hair of the Lincolnshire pig as it was much softer 

 and more like wool than hair. Further, the County Cork type 

 of pig did not seem to possess that robust constitution which is 

 so characteristic of the Lincolnshire pig. It had more the 

 appearance of a pig which had been so interbred as to lose its 

 constitution and which had entered on its last stage. The subject 

 of these notes is in every respect the exact opposite, as it certainly 

 appears to have been vastly improved, not only in constitution but 

 in form and substance since classes for the breed were included 

 in the prize schedule of the county agricultural society. The 

 writer's first experience of the North Lincolnshire pig was in the 

 fifties of the past century when the curliness of the hair was not 

 so generally noticeable, nor did the pigs of that period possess in 

 so marked a degree the quality of early maturity. Then, as 

 now, the sows were prolific and good mothers, whilst the pigs were 

 very hardy, but they required to be of considerable age before 

 they responded readily to the fattening process. This resulted 

 in fat pigs of a size and degree of fatness which would not find 

 favour in the eye of the consumer of the present day, even in 

 Lincolnshire where the average fat pig killed for consumption on 

 the farm would scarcely pass muster at any market outside the 

 particular county. 



The probable reason for the very heavy and fat type of pig 

 finding favour in the county of Lincoln was that, in the northern 

 part of the county especially, a considerable proportion of the 

 horsemen, cattle men, and shepherds used to live in the farm 

 houses or in the houses of the ground keepers or foremen, the 

 latter receiving from the farmer a certain weight of bacon annu- 

 ally in part payment of the cost of keep of the men. Both in 

 the farm house and in the ground keeper's house bacon formed 

 the chief meat consumed by the men, whose appetites had not 

 been pampered, so that they made no objection to fat bacon made 



