Chester the boar came to Lori McNaught’s sliding glass door every morning asking to be let in. Though KuneKune pigs like him can reach more than 300 pounds, the New Gloucester family’s friendly “house pig” was welcome inside their home and, sometimes, helped himself to their dog’s food.
McNaught soon purchased several more pigs from Florida and began breeding them two years ago to sell piglets, which many raise for meat. Chester now had company of his own kind and stayed inside the barn at Firefly Hill Farm. But his affection for humans is typical of KuneKunes, which owners say have doglike personalities.
Twenty years ago, these grazing pigs from New Zealand were rare in the United States, and 50 years ago they nearly went extinct. Today they’re growing in popularity in Maine because of their suitability for small operations and the relationships they form with the people who raise them.
The KuneKune pig (pronounced “cooney cooney”) is considered a rare heritage breed. Its name comes from a Maori word meaning “fat and round,” or “short and round” by some accounts. The pigs came to North America from New Zealand, where they may have been introduced by long-ago whalers.
KuneKunes are grazers, mostly eating grass. They don’t root in the ground as aggressively as other breeds because of their shorter, flatter snouts. They are gentle with children and other animals, small enough to manage, have simple nutritional needs and produce fine fat-marbled meat. Traditionally, they were raised for lard.
At Pen and Cob farm in Pembroke, Katherine Swann calls her several KuneKunes her “orchard pigs” because they graze among her apple trees without harming the roots. Each thrives on just a quarter of an acre throughout the growing season.
Swann slaughters and processes the animals herself, and the lower grain cost allows her to be flexible with butchering dates. They grow more slowly than other breeds, but because their calorie needs are lower overall, she spends less to feed them. In fact, she’s careful not to overfeed, which can make their faces get so fat the pigs can’t see.
In Washington County, Swann doesn’t know many others raise KuneKunes. She said that may be because multigenerational farmers are already established with traditional breeds. New livestock owners, like herself and many beginning homesteaders, might be more likely to find these heritage breeds and try raising them.
The American KuneKune Pig Society lists eight registered breeders in Maine, and local social media groups dedicated to the pigs have hundreds of members.
Interest is growing, according to Cherish Goodman of Stow, who breeds for pets and brood stock and is a member of the International KuneKune Pig Society. The group plans an exhibit at the Blue Hill Fair in September, its first. If that goes well, Maine may host the first in-person KuneKune livestock show in the country next year, Goodman said.
The society has started three shows in recent years, which owners compete in virtually by submitting videos of their pigs walking, lured by apples on sticks or other treats.
Goodman is working to expand the society’s membership in the Northeast, particularly through education. She wants people to know the pigs keep growing for five years, that buying from a reputable breeder reduces health problems and that different blood lines have different features.
The KuneKunes are also smart, strong and curious, requiring sturdy fencing to keep them in. Though they are gentler than most hogs, they’re still large livestock.
McNaught, the New Gloucester breeder, worries the KuneKunes may be a fad that owners will grow tired of when they realize how much work they require. She also raises Nigerian dwarf goats, a trendy animal she sees some people rehoming.
For McNaught, the work is worth it. She doesn’t have her own animals processed; they’re more like her pets, though she sells piglets.
“They’re also really sweet, smart, funny and love belly rubs,” she said. “You rub their belly and they’ll just fall over.”
