overweight and something growing between hooves

Question
Corkey is about 2 years old and he is over weight and he needs his hooves trimmed but i noticed he has been limping on his rear foot and i noticed what looks like a round growth of hoof growing out between his hooves. I dontknow what to do about this and the vet dosent seem to want to look at him. Also what can i feed him to keep him full and happy but still lose weight. He is an indoor pig. I try to get hm to go out but with his foot hurting and his weight problem he wont go outside. Any help i can get would be appericated.

Answer
Pigs sometimes develop a kind of "wart" in between their toes. A splinter off a hoof might also look like a wart between the toes.

There really isn't much the average person can do at home about these growths. Sometimes, if the foot is kept very clean, they will just sort of grow out and fall off. Keeping the feet clean and applying moisturizer to the hooves will prevent them from splitting.

Overweight pigs are trapped in a cycle. They need to exercise more and eat less. But exercise is difficult and uncomfortable or even painful.

The best way to judge a pigs weight is by looking at him carefully. On the website www.farec.org there's a chart of line drawings of pigs, from near starvation to morbidly obese. You can compare your pig to the illustrations to get an idea of where piggy is and where piggy needs to go.

Plain oatmeal or rolled oats from the feed store is a high fiber, low calorie, nutritious and filling food. Oatmeal or rolled oats can be substituted for up to 1/2 the daily ration of pig pellets, but only for three or four months.

"Full" pigs sleep. "Hungry" pigs get up and snurdle around. Start by cutting back on pellets and rationing treats. No "free treats", piggy must perform a trick or obey a command in order to get a treat. When all the treats are gone, use pellets from piggy's dinner ration, one pellet at a time.

Another technique is to feed piggy semi-cooked oatmeal or rolled oats in the dish at mealtime, and put the pellet ration into a Busy Ball. A Busy Ball is basically a ball with holes, as the ball is pushed the food falls out the holes bit by bit. You can buy one ready made, or make your own with a 2 liter soda bottle or milk carton or wiffle ball. Another approach is to scatter the pellets on the floor or a very large mat, and let piggy snurdle for each one.

A daily training session will help with exercise. When piggy's daily food ration is cut back, piggy will be a lot more interested in practicing simple tricks.