Lazy piggy

Question
Hello. My piggy sumo is 2 years old and he has never been very active.  He goes outside everyday sometimes for a couple of min other days for hours and he just walks my property eating and rooting.  But when he is in the house he is always sleeping. Either on my bed, the floor, or the couch.  He is about 177lbs and the vet says he is about 50lbs overweight so I decreased his snacks.  But he was only getting 1/2 cup of food so I couldn't cut him back anymore on feed! I'm ok with the laziness but now it seems that his poop is coming in little hard pellets and I'm not sure if it's because of the lack of excersise or if I'm not feeding him enough?  Any suggestions?  I was thinking of adopting another piglet... Do u think sumo would play if he had a baby sister?

Answer
Feeding pigs is more art than science. Each pig is different, and the activity level has a huge impact. The general rule of thumb is 1 cup pelleted pot-bellied pig food per 50 lb of pig. For weight loss, the recommendation is 1/2 - 2/3 cup plus enough plain oats to equal 1 cup per 50 lb of pig.

Pig poop should be oval shaped "berries". They should come out soft, not oily or dried. Hard, dried or compacted pig berries usually indicate a lack of water.

Using the general formula, a 150 lb pig should get about 3 cups pig food per day. But, if Sumo needs to loose weight, then it's ok to cut that amount by half, and substitute plain oats (instant or regular) for the rest. Mix the oats and pellets with enough warm water to make everything mushy.

Treats pack a lot of calories. Eliminating treats, except for training, often helps house pigs loose weight. Also, a short daily training session gets piggy up and moving. Trick training isn't about the piggy doing tricks, it's about pig and person communicating with each other.

"Hungry" pigs tend to be more active. They walk around looking for interesting things to nibble. "Full" pigs tend to just collapse and sleep.

Adult pigs generally don't "play" with each other, but they do interact and stimulate each other. Pigs are territorial creatures, so introducing a new pig can be a little difficult at first. But once the pigs have worked things out between them, chances are they'll be fast friends.