{{Short description|British dog cross-breed}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2021}} {{EngvarB|date=May 2021}} {{about|the dog type|various ships|HMS Lurcher{{!}}HMS ''Lurcher''}} {{Infobox Dogbreed |name= Lurcher |image= File:Lurcher on Mountain.jpg |image_caption= |altname= Poacher's dog |nickname= |country=Great Britain and Ireland | coat = Any | colour = Any | litter_size = variable | life_span = |note= |}} [[File:Taplin, The Sportsman's Cabinet, Lurcher (facing page 103) (cropped).jpg|thumb|alt=engraving of a rough-haired dog of sighthound type|Lurcher, illustration from ''The Sportsman's Cabinet'' by William Taplin, 1803; engraved from a painting by Philip Reinagle]] A '''lurcher''' is a crossbred dog resulting from mating a greyhound or other sighthound with a dog of another type such as a herding dog or a terrier. The lurcher is not a "breed": the term is a generic descriptor of a diverse group of dogs. They are known for being loyal, fast, and versatile. For hundreds of years, lurchers were strongly associated with poaching; in modern times, they are kept as hunting or companion dogs.
== History == ''Lurcher'' is an old English term for a crossbred dog; specifically, the result of mating a sighthound with a dog of another type, typically a working breed. The term was first used with this meaning in 1668; it is considered to be derived from the verb ''lurch'', apparently a variant form of ''lurk'', meaning ''lurk'' or ''steal''.{{sfn|Russell|2018|page=29}}<ref>{{cite OED|lurcher|38725421}}</ref><ref>{{cite OED|lurch|38724696}}</ref> The tendency to "wrench" and "cut" rather than "course" was considered to be unfair and a violation of "The Law of the Leash."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rL4UAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22Laws+of+the+Leash%22&pg=PA193|title=The Sportsman's Cyclopaedia|first=Thomas Burgeland|last=Johnson|publisher=Henry G. Bohn|year=2023|orig-date=1848|page=193}}</ref>
In England from 1389, the right to keep a dog of any kind used in hunting{{ref label|parliament|note 1}} was limited by law to those ''qualified'' by possessing lands, holdings, or income worth more than ten pounds per annum; in other words, royalty, nobility, the gentry, and the wealthy.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/dictionaryof_kelh_1779_00/page/n145/mode/2up?q=lerce|title=A dictionary of the Norman or Old French language : collected from such Acts of Parliament, Parliament rolls, journals, Acts of state, records, law books, antient historians, and manuscripts as related to this nation...|first=Robert|last=Kelham|publisher=Edward Brooke|location=London|year=1779}}</ref> This law, though repeatedly modified, remained in force until 1831.{{sfn|Russell|2018|page=29}} As a result, hunters and poachers bred sighthounds with breeds that could disguise their sighthound bloodline, often under thick rough coats, whilst adding other abilities including intelligence, stamina or turning speed. The dog chosen for this could be an available farm dog, often a collie or terrier.
In the nineteenth century, the word was used to describe some rough-haired regional greyhounds, which were banned from competition by coursing clubs such as Swaffham and Newmarket, due to the perception that they cut "turns" to kill instead of working the hare to gain points.{{sfn|Russell|2018|page=88}}
== Description == A lurcher is a cross, generally between a sighthound and a working dog breed. Generally, the aim of the cross is to produce a sighthound with more intelligence, a canny animal suitable for poaching rabbits, hares, and game birds. Over time, poachers and hunters discovered that the crossing of certain breeds with sighthounds produced a dog better suited to this purpose, given the lurcher's combination of speed and intelligence.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Complete Lurcher|first=David Brian|last=Plummer|publisher=Boydell Press|year=1979|isbn=978-0851151182|oclc=15674881}}</ref> In more recent times, the crossing of different sighthound breeds with each other (e.g. a greyhound with a saluki) has become more common. These dogs were traditionally called longdogs but these days "lurcher" is applied to them as well.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.gspca.ie/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/GSPCA-Why-Lurchers-Make-Great-Pets-1.pdf|publisher=Galway SPCA|title=Why Lurchers Make Great Pets|access-date=31 January 2024}}</ref>
thumb|Saluki lurcher
== Use == Lurchers were traditionally bred in England to assist poachers in hunting rabbits and hares. Around the world they are kept as sporting dogs and family pets,<ref>{{cite book|title=The House Lurcher: Care, rearing and training at home|first=Jackie|last=Drakeford|publisher=Swan Hill Press|year=2003|isbn=978-1904057345}}</ref> or to compete in sports such as lure coursing and dog racing. In the United States they may compete in lure coursing events through the AKC and the UKC.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.akc.org/sports/coursing/lure-coursing/ |work=American Kennel Club|title=Lure Coursing|access-date=17 September 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ukcdogs.com/lure-coursing|work=United Kennel Club|title=Lure Coursing|access-date=17 September 2025}}</ref> Cross-breeds are not registered and formally recognized by any major kennel club. In North America, the Canadian Kennel Club can deprive individual members of their club rights if they have been proven of crossbreeding any breed as in creating lurchers; in the US, lurchers can be registered with the North American Lurcher and Longdog Association.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sighthoundsafield.org/NALLA-Overview.html|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180621065917/https://www.sighthoundsafield.org/NALLA-Overview.html|archive-date=21 June 2018|work=North American Lurcher and Longdog Association|title=Constitution}}</ref>{{needs update|reason=website is defunct|date=September 2025}}
==Notes== {{note|parliament}}As stated in an Act of Parliament: "None shall hunt but they which have sufficient living" in the Anglo-Norman and English of the time: ''null leverer, ne lerce, nautre chien pur chacer'',<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/statutesatlargef01grea/page/388/mode/2up?q=none+shall+hunt+...+lerce|title= The statutes at large : from Magna Charta, to the end of the last parliament, 1761. In eight volumes|author-first1=Owen|author-last1=Ruffhead|author-first2=John|author-last2=Adams|volume=1|publisher=Mark Baskett, Henry Woodfall and William Strahan|location=London|year=1763|page=388}}</ref> translated as "no greyhound, hound nor other dog to hunt"
==References== {{reflist}}
==Bibliography== *{{cite journal|first=Edmund|last=Russell|year=2018|title=Greyhound Nation: A Coevolutionary History of England, 1200–1900|journal=Studies in Environment and History|location=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press|doi=10.1017/9781139049269|isbn=978-1-139-04926-9}} {{subscription required}}
== Further reading == * Arthur W. Coaten (1909). ''British Hunting: A Complete History of the National Sport of Great Britain and Ireland from Earliest Records''. London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co * E. P. Thompson (1975). ''Whigs and Hunters: The Origin of the Black Act'' London: Allen Lane * P. B. Munsche (1981). ''Gentlemen and Poachers: The English Game Laws, 1671–1831''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press * Harriet Ritvo (1987).''The Animal Estate: The English and Other Creatures in the Victorian Age''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press * David Cannadine (1990). ''The Decline and Fall of the British Aristocracy'' New Haven: Yale University Press * Roger B. Manning (1993). ''Hunters and Poachers: A Social and Cultural History of Unlawful Hunting in England, 1485–1640''. Oxford; New York: Clarendon Press; Oxford University Press. * Emma Griffin (2007). ''Blood Sport: Hunting in Britain since 1066''. New Haven; London: Yale University Press * Barry Lewis (2009). ''Hunting in Britain: From the Ice Age to the Present''. Stroud, Gloucestershire: History Press
{{British dogs}} {{Cur hunting dogs}} {{hounds}} {{Terriers}} {{Domestic dog}}
Category:Dog types Category:Sighthounds
Category:Dog crossbreeds