My son wants to know why Poo is always brown..... Help! page

[Warmbear]

So my son, man does he come up with questions or what? I have no idea why Poo is brown no matter what we eat, can anyone explain it without resorting to potty humor? He has been watching what he eats then watches his poo to see if it changes.


kids.....

[Goldie]

It's just like when you mix paints of all different colors and end up with brown. Mix foods of all different colors and they end up brown...

Have him eat a lot of watermelon some time and see if it changes! I think beets will also make changes.

He sounds like my kind of kid! My son, after watching cows mate, wanted to know how snakes do it.

[workinprogress]

Eating lots of Berries changes it also. As I understand the color mostly comes from bile salts and broken down blood cells.

[primalrob]

tell him that all the good vitamins in food are in the colors, and whatever is left over all gets mixed together and called poop.

it would be a fun experiment and a great way to get him to eat a variety of foods to see what might change the colors, like beets or brocolli, or spinach, etc.
in fact, i know a guy from college who did something similar for an art project. talk about avant garde.

[snoops]

mine go greenish when I drink green smoothies regularly however I think that means I am not absorbing a lot of the nutrients they are going through me.

[SophieScreams]

Sorry to pop your poo bubbles, but it's used and discarded red blood cells:

Why is poo brown? › Dr Karl's Great Moments In Science (ABC Science)

[keithpowers]

Sorry to pop your poo bubbles, but it's used and discarded red blood cells:

Why is poo brown? › Dr Karl's Great Moments In Science (ABC Science)

And a fair amount of bilirubin...

[Noctiluca]

The majority of the bulk of your poop is dead bacteria (I think) from your intestinal tract. They happen to be brown. Also as mentioned above, bile, stomach acids, etc play a part. And I would argue that all poop is not brown! Poop can be green or yellow too. And if you eat red beets it can be bright red and scare you into thinking your butt is bleeding!

[JoanieL]

... And if you eat red beets it can be bright red and scare you into thinking your butt is bleeding!

Laughing at the beet thing. The first time I ate cooked beets in any quantity, not only did my poo turn red, but I peed pink. It had never happened with canned beets (Mom used to make them) and it had never happened when I just put a few pieces of steamed beets into a yogurt smoothie. Scared the heck out of me until I realized... oh yeah... beets.

[SophieScreams]

Freshly juiced beets make my urine magenta!