Kunekune
breed of domestic pig
The kunekune (Māori pronunciation: [kʉnɛkʉnɛ]) is a small breed of domestic pig from New Zealand. Kunekune are hairy with a rotund build, and may bear wattles hanging from their lower jaws. Their colour ranges from black and white, to ginger, cream, gold-tip, black, brown, and tricoloured. They have a docile, friendly nature.
History
The breed is believed to have descended from an Asian domestic breed introduced to New Zealand in the early 19th century by whalers or traders. They differ markedly from the feral pig of European origin known in New Zealand as a "Captain Cooker". The native Māori people of New Zealand adopted Kunekune; kunekune is a Māori word meaning 'fat and round'.
By the 1980s, only an estimated 50 purebred Kunekune remained. Michael Willis and John Simister, wildlife park owners, started a breeding recovery programme, which encouraged other recovery efforts. As of 2010, the breed no longer faces extinction, with breed societies in both New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
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This entry incorporates text from “Kunekune” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.