Which piggy's are you killing (pigs are best route I've found so far)? I usually go to the Treespeak pigs, but instead of using the camp everyone always goes to, I head further east to the camp near the NM spawn point. I usually get a decent spread of buttons there. I def. got more buttons than anything else there. But yes it sucks that every recipe that needs them, needs them in 3's. (I got about 30ish last time I spend around 30 mins there).

The best way to get buttons is to let ALL your friends know you need them. I usually make a 'KK's grocery list' thread on my ls's forums. This helps my ls mates know what I'm looking for and they usually save me the grocery/food items they don't need or use this way.

This all being said, if I find a better mob, I'll let you know. (I need to go poke some higher level funguars at some point to help an alc friend find some drops anyway).