Hüniken

Hüniken is a municipality in the district of Wasseramt in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland. Hüniken is first mentioned around 1263-64 as P. de Hunnechoven. Hüniken has an area, , of . Of this area, or 77.2% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 15.8% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 6.9% is settled (buildings or roads). Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 5.0% and transportation infrastructure made up 2.0%. Out of the forested land, all of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, 55.4% is used for growing crops and 19.8% is pastures, while 2.0% is used for orchards or vine crops. The municipality is located in the Wasseramt district, on a ground moraine. The houses are scattered around the Chapel of St. Michael and stretch toward Etziken. The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Gules a Fir Tree issuant from a Mount of 3 Coupeaux Vert. Hüniken has a population () of , all Swiss citizens. Over the last 10 years (1999–2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of 26.5%. It has changed at a rate of 20.6% due to migration and at a rate of 1.5% due to births and deaths. Most of the population () speaks German (66 or 98.5%) with the rest speaking English the gender distribution of the population was 46.5% male and 53.5% female. The population was made up of 40 Swiss men (46.5% of the population) and (0.0%) non-Swiss men. There were 46 Swiss women (53.5%) and (0.0%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality 37 or about 55.2% were born in Hüniken and lived there in 2000. There were 21 or 31.3% who were born in the same canton, while 8 or 11.9% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 1 or 1.5% were born outside of Switzerland. In , from births and deaths, the population of Swiss citizens and the foreign population remained the same. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was a decrease of 3 and the non-Swiss population remained the same. This represents a population growth rate of -3.