Appearance: Kune Kunes are covered in hair.  This covering can vary between short or long and straingt or curly.  Coat colors include cream, gold, ginger, brown, black, tri colored, and spotted combinations.  They have medium to short upturnned snouts and pricked or semi-lopped ears.  Their short legs and short, round body live up to the meaning of their name--Kune Kune--"round and fat".  An unusual feature of this breed are the two tassels or wattles called piri piri under the chin, which are similar to those seen in Toggenburg goats.  The Kunes stand about 24 inches tall and weigh in at anywhere from 80 to 240 lbs.

Personality: The Kune Kune is a delightful pig!  They are docile and friendly and thrive on human companionship.  The breed is intelligent and easy to train, as many owners of these animals will readily confirm.  Our pigs have begged for belly scratches from the day we picked them up at the airport. As soon as they hear the gate to the pasture squeek they make their way to greet you.

Living Conditions: The natural habitat of the Kune Kune is woodland and pasture.  They do best out of doors and are hardy in a range of climates.  Our brown and white Agnes hails form colder climate of Idaho while our ginger and black Matilda comes from the warm climate of southern California.  They can be ideal for a large yard or garden as long as owners ensure they are given adequate room to roam.

Management: The Kune Kune is easy to manage, as it has the ability to thrive on little more than grass, as well as a disinclination to roam (most of the time).  Our pigs do not venture far from our barnyard even when left in open pasture with no fencing.  Kunes do not do well on a diet with too much protein.  Its feed should contain no more than 16 % protein and they require more fiber than most other swine. Kunes love fresh fruit and vegetables!  We give generous portions of our raw kitchen scraps daily, much to our herds' delight.

Breeding: Kune Kune breeders accross the country are realizing that Kune Kunes can be slower to reach maturity than once thought.  Boars can possibly become fertile at six to seven months and gilts could get pregnant as early as five months.  You should, however, wait until gilts are at least 12 months of age before trying to mate them.  We are finding that pairing older(by several months), mature (but not necessarily expierenced) boars with our gilts  is providing better results when breeding for the first time.  Kune Kune sows make good mothers.  Litters sizes vary but are usually smaller than other swine breeds.


Kune Kune History

A Brief History...

There is a growing enthusiasm for the Kune Kune (pronounced 'coo-nee, coo-nee').  New Zealand was home to the last of the breed although the breed is not indigenous to that country.  Kept by the Moari people, no one is really sure where Kunes originated from and there are several theories as to how they come to New Zealand. Nearly extinct in the 1970s, Michael Willis and John Simister bought up the last 18 Kune Kunes and  began striving to preserve the breed.  With their expertise the Kune population grew. They arrived in Britain in 1992 when it was decided, in case disease occurred in their home country, that another population should be established elsewhere.  The British Kune Kune Pig Society was set up in 1993.   In 1995 Katie Rigby of Kansas imported the first KuneKunes into the United States directly from New Zealand with the assistance of members of the New Zealand Kunekune Association and approval by the Elders of the Maori people.  (To learn more about the Rigby imports please visit  www.AmericanKuneKuneBreeders.com  )  Not until 2005 did Jim and Lori Enright of USA KuneKunes import the first KunesKunes from Great Britain.  The Enrights have been instrumental in promoting the breed in this country and are the first breeders to freely sell breeding stock to others.  Mr. and Mrs. Enright are the co-founders of the official breed registry in the United States, American KuneKune Breeders Association, of which we are now members.

Recently Cyndi Berry, of KuneKune Preserve in Mount Pleasant North Carolina, who retains the largest herd of Kunekunes in America (givin to her by Katie Rigby upon her retirement) has also begun to sell breeding stock to registered breeders of AKBA.  Introducing Cyndi's diverse lines into the Enright import's offspring has added much needed genetic diversity.  Black Valley Farm is attempting to utilize genetics from both of these previously closed herds in all of our future breeding. 

Currently in the United States, due to limited genetics Kune Kunes are being bred using the practice of linebreeding.  Linebreeding is a practice that involves the inbreeding of closely related family members, such as fathers to daughters, for the purpose of concentrating bloodlines to fix particularly valuable traits.  Most breeds have been established through the use of at least some linebreeding, but Linebreeding should not be indeiscriminately practiced, as it can bring out less than desirable traits.  Therefore, as the population expands we are striving to diversify genetics.