Bunny kisses might sound really cute until you find out that rabbits eat their own poop.
Hey dedicated defecators, Jules here for DNews!
If you own a dog, or a rabbit, or a dung beetle (no judgment), then you might have noticed
that unlike most humans, they love to eat poop.
Their own poop, the poop of other animals, it’s like the world is their poop buffet.
And as a responsible pet owner, you may be inclined to put a stop to this behavior, but
it turns out: that would make YOU the poopy-head.
The term for when animals eat excrement is “Coprophagia”, “kopros” coming from
the greek term for ‘poop’, and “phagia” being the greek suffix for ‘eating’.
Poop-eating.
And plenty of animals do this, the most common being rodents, and lagomorphs, which are rabbits,
hares, and pika.
Interestingly, both rodents and lagomorphs share a common ancestor, which may explain
their similar habits.
In fact, this poop-eating habit is necessary for these animals to survive.
See, rodents and lagomorphs have really inefficient digestive systems; the absorption of food
happens in the lower gastrointestinal tract, and very little is actually absorbed.
So, to make sure the necessary nutrients get into their system, these animals simply run
them through the digestive system again, by eating what they excrete.
Interestingly, lagomorphs produce two different types of poop, one that is hard and inedible
(they leave that alone), and the other is soft and nutrient rich, called “cecotropes”
or “night feces”.
Cecotropes are produced in a different part of the digestive tract, and are coated with
mucus so they survive the trip.
And even though it still exits the anus, it is not technically considered “feces”,
and so technically it’s not coprophagia.
Either way, these animals are eating something that came out of their butt.
But rabbits, rodents, and hares are not the only ones ordering poop for pickup.
The dung beetle, as you can probably imagine, also eat, well, dung.
They actually extract nutrients, specifically nitrogen, from animal excrement, and sometimes
use the pile as a nest for their offspring.
Piglets, foals, nonhuman primates and dogs also eat poop, although less regularly.
The young of some of these mammals, foals and dogs for example, eat their mother’s
poop in order to populate their gut bacteria, which is necessary for breaking down food
in the stomach.
Moreover, mother dogs will often lick their puppies anus and genitals to stimulate defecation.
Then, for quick cleanup, the mother dog will just eat whatever comes out.
I mean, it’s faster than carrying one of those poop bag dispensers.
This habit of eating mom’s poop, or having mom eat your poop tends to end after the animal
is weaned, but some animals seems to acquire a taste for it, and they keep up the habit.
According to veterinarians, dogs eating poop, whether it is their own, or a stranger’s,
is natural and generally not harmful.
In rare cases, it can potentially transmit a disease or cause vomiting and diarrhea.
And, if they jump up to give you a kiss, it’s a definitely gross.
Now, as for humans, eating poop isn’t quite so carefree.
Coprophagia is usually associated with mental illness, and human poop, especially someone
else’s, can contain bacteria such as shigella, campylobacter, salmonella and E.coli.
Those can make you VERY sick.
Long story short: rabbits, rats, and dogs eating poop: usually fine and healthy.
Humans eating poop: Nope.
Nope nope nope.
If you’re into animal poop or just animals that start with P, you might like the show Panda Republic.
Now you can watch that and all the other Animal Planet shows on Animal Planet Go.
Check out the link in the description or download it from your app store.
So if your dog eats poop, should you let your dog lick your face?
Or will you get a whole bunch of weird diseases?
You can find out right here.
And what other weird animal habits do you want to know about?
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