Are you wondering what you should and shouldn’t feed your Kune Kune?

I have raised KuneKunes for years and one of the best parts about raising them is they are not picky eaters.

If you have ever heard the phrase “slop the hogs” its because pigs love eating leftovers and food scraps.

There are only a few things that I will never feed my KuneKunes and things I have noticed that they don’t like.

So lets discuss what KuneKunes can and should not eat.

Kune Kunes are omnivores meaning like people their diet can consist of plants and meat. Unlike commercial pigs, Kune Kunes needs less than 16% protein to be healthy. They thrive on a diet of grass, fruit, grains, nuts, and vegetables. Kune Kunes can be fed meat and other animal products but shouldn’t be fed pork.

Let’s take a deeper look at what you can feed your Kune Kunes to keep them healthy and thriving.

Do Kune Kune Pigs Eat Grass Or Hay?

One of the biggest reasons I decided to start raising KuneKunes was because most of their diet can be made up of grass and hay.

The best part is since they have upturned noses they won’t root up your lawn or pasture. 

A majority of KuneKunes diet is made up of grass and fresh greens.

In the spring, summer and fall they will eat lots of fresh grass or pasture and durning the winter time they can eat grass hay or alfalfa hay.

It was surprising when we first got our Kune Kunes to see how much grass they eat.

They would spend quite a bit of time grazing on our back lawn eating lots of grass.

Looking at their droppings they would be slightly green and you can see plenty of digested grass.

One year we got a bunch of moldy hay that we were going to use to mulch our garden.

When the ground thawed we found that they had eaten most of they hay.

They avoided the moldy hay and found the hay that was still green.

Letting your Kune Kune graze on your lawn or pasture will keep them healthy and happy and in the winter it is good to feed them hay.

What Vegetables Can Kune Kune Pigs Eat?

We don’t ever throw away any food scraps anymore.

It all goes in a stainless steel pale that we take out to our KuneKunes every day.

Most of those food scraps consist of various vegetable peels and leftovers our kids didn’t finish.

KuneKunes can eat all vegetables including, celery, potatoes, tomatoes, and lettuce. They need less protein than other pig breeds so more of their diet can consist mostly of vegetables, grains and grass. They don’t like onion skins.

We have fed our KuneKunes all kinds of vegetable scraps.

Celery ends, potatoes peels, cucumbers, and bad lettuce are all vegetables we have fed our Kune Kunes and they really pig out.

Feel free to feed them any and all vegetables because they will love it. 

One time one of our Kune Kunes got in our garden and ate a bunch our winter squash and pumpkins.

As frustrating as that was I am glad our Kune Kune got a healthy snack.

What I Feed My Kune Kunes

Kune Kunes are really simple to feed.

I like to do it as inexpensive as possible while still keeping them healthy.

I let my Kune Kunes eat all the grass or pasture they want.

Before I had my farm they would graze our lawn and now that we have pasture they love getting the variety of greens a pasture provides.

In the winter I will give them some grass or alfalfa hay.

Next, we keep all of our food scraps.

We throw everything in their except pork and pork bones and egg shells.

They can probably eat eggshells but we put those in our garden or feed them back to our chickens instead.

Depending on how much scraps your family creates. 

While I have noticed my Kune Kunes don’t like onion peels and orange peels I still throw them in the pale. 

They will pick through and not eat them.

Lastly, I feed my Kune Kunes 1 to 2 cups each of 18% protein chicken feed.

I buy this feed in bulk.

You can purchase mini pig feed but it is rather expensive and not really necessary if you are giving them table scraps and grass.

The chicken feed has a variety of vitamins and minerals that makes sure they are getting all the nutrients they need.

Can you KuneKunes Eat Meat And Eggs?

Often our table scraps will also consist of meat scraps and chicken bones.

Kune Kunes are omnivores which means they can eat meat and plants. While meat shouldn’t be the majority of their diet they can eat, beef, chicken, fish, and other meat and animal products like eggs. The only meat I don’t feed my KuneKunes is pork.

I have learned from experience that KuneKunes can eat whole chickens and like it.

I discovered this because a bunch of my neighbors gave me their old chickens who had stopped laying eggs.

It was winter and I had the Kune Kunes and chickens together prepping my garden.

Since the chickens were old some would die and I noticed my Kune Kune would then eat them.

Only the dead ones never the alive ones. So don’t worry.

Ever since then whenever I have found a dead chicken I will feed it to the Kune Kune feathers bones and all. All that is left is a few feathers. 

Instead of feeding my dog chicken bones now, we feed them to our Kune Kunes and they love them. 

Kune Kunes can probably eat pork but I figured it is not great to have them engage in cannibalism I am sure in the wild if there was a dead pig they would have no problem eating it.

Kune Kunes love eggs.

I noticed that my baby kunekune pigs were getting fatter than normal.

My chickens’ egg production also dramatically dropped.

I didn’t put it together until later but my baby Kune Kunes were getting into the chicken coop and eating all the eggs that were laid on the ground.

I figured out how they were getting in the coop and that cured their egg addiction. 

The other day we noticed that our geese had been sitting on their nest of eggs rather long.

It had been well past the time they should have hatched.

When we checked they were all rotten.

What do you do with 30 rotten goose eggs?

Feed them to your Kune Kunes of course.

We through them over the fence and they made a feast for our pigs.

Maui our KuneKune bore went to eat a goose egg that didn’t pop and when he took a bit it popped in his mouth.

It scared him pretty bad and he ran back into the barn until he realized he wasn’t in danger anymore.

It was hilarious.

Can Kune Kunes Eat Bread?

Growing up one of the things my dad would do to offset the cost of raising pigs was go get old bread and pastries from the store for free. 

Kune Kunes can eat all bread products and other grains. Bread has great nutrition for Kune Kunes. Instead of throwing out moldy bread or bread scraps feed them to your Kune Kunes.

As much as I hate throwing out bread it is good to know that our Kune Kunes will thoroughly enjoy it.

Can Kune Kune Pigs Eat Fruit?

Since we feed our Kunekunes table scraps they often get fruit. I have never seen them not eat fruit when given to them.

Kune Kune pigs will eat all kinds of fruit including strawberries, banana peels, apples and peels, oranges, berries, apricots, peaches, and pears. Fruit should not make up the majority of their diet but should also include grains and grasses. 

I have noticed that Kune Kunes don’t like citrus peels.

They will eat oranges and other citrus when the fruit is included but they will often leave just the peels leftover.  

Every winter we go to Arizona and pick boxes and boxes of citrus including oranges, lemons and grapefruit.

We feed the kunekunes all the rotten ones and all the peels.

They will eat them but they don’t prefer them.

They do like clementine peels probably because they aren’t as bitter.

Growing up we would supplement our pig feed with fruit that fell to the ground and spoiled from our fruit trees.

If you have your own fruit trees letting your Kune Kunes clean up the mess that it makes is an excellent idea. That way you don’t have to pick it up yourself.

One time I fed my pig a half of watermelon it was adorable watching her eat it in delight.

Can Kune Kunes Eat Acorns?

One time my backyard gate was left open and when we found out our pig was gone. We found her at our neighbor’s house eating acorns.

Kune Kunes like other pig breeds natural habitat is forest. Tree nuts like acorns made up a big part of their diets. Kune Kunes love eating acorns and while they are toxic to humans without being properly processed pigs can eat and digest them fine.

Eating acorns and other fallen tree nuts is a very natural thing for kunekunes to eat.

Once my pig discovered those acorns at my neighbors every time she got out I knew exactly where to find her.

I would often get handfuls and bring them back to her as treats.  

If you have nut trees consider yourself lucky because your kunekune will love cleaning it up.

You should now have a pretty good idea of what you should and shouldn’t feed your Kune Kune.

To sum it up really the only thing I would feed them is pork.

Anything you can eat they can eat and much more like food scraps and rotten or moldy food.

If you are in the habit of throwing away food, then get a slop bucket and start giving it to your Kune Kunes.

They will happily eat it all.