Stoneman - totally get the leaching affect and soil conditions. My reference coins are not porous - they conserved well thru the encrustation down to a patina without any pitting, loss of weight, etc...
I went thru my current WIP pile and out of 50 or so LWCs I'm working on I pulled 4 that have the tiger stripes. What I find interesting is that all are 1910s or early 20's. I have often found that earlier LWCs and IHCs tend to hold up better to corrosion. My theory is the 5% tin and zinc was comprised of a higher percentage of tin back then. And when Zinc prices collapsed by 1930 the mint adjusted the ratio to more Zinc....leading to more rot on LWC/LMC ground coins. Tin is much more corrosion resistant than Zinc.