# Do dogs gain a more vibrant gut ecosystem from eating poop? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 10, 2017, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315 "2017-05-10T21:28:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2017, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/1 "2017-05-10T21:28:14Z")
From this article, a guy did a DIY gut flora transplant: [https://www.theverge.com/2016/5/4/11581994/fmt-fecal-matter-transplant-josiah-zayner-microbiome-ibs-c-diff](https://www.theverge.com/2016/5/4/11581994/fmt-fecal-matter-transplant-josiah-zayner-microbiome-ibs-c-diff) With dogs routinely doing this, do they gain a more resilient gut biome? Is that part of why they’re able to eat pretty much whatever – by trading gut flora with one another? ---
**Author:** ![Mikeisskeptical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c0e974/32.png) [@Mikeisskeptical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mikeisskeptical)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/2 "2017-05-11T00:10:54Z")
I think it’s the other way round. Humans have pathetically weak guts as a result of cooking most of our food for the past several thousand years. Dogs have evolved very resilient digestive systems as a result their ancestors being oportunistic scavengers. Therefore they _can_ eat poop. They can also eat some pretty funky meat and I don’t think it would improve your own gut biome to emulate this. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/3 "2017-05-11T00:38:41Z")
Well, if my dog’s gut is so tough why whenever she eats anything other than her regular dog food (like she gets into the cat’s food) she gets the runs for a day or three? Plus, she has never had any inclination to eat dog poop, either her own or other dogs’. Now cat poop or goose poop or… ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/4 "2017-05-11T01:02:52Z")
Yeah, I’ve got to say none of my dogs had ever eaten poop. None of them were all that finicky, either, belonging to the species _canis eatius anythingus_. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/5 "2017-05-11T03:12:27Z")
> [@Mikeisskeptical](#): > > … Dogs have evolved very resilient digestive systems as a result their ancestors being oportunistic scavengers. Therefore they _can_ eat poop… So now I know why they do two things. ---
**Author:** ![TRC4941](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trc4941/32/6792_2.png) [@TRC4941](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TRC4941)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/6 "2017-05-11T14:03:54Z")
I don’t have the answer but my dogs’ digestive systems are a mystery to me. We hike in the woods every morning and if I’m not watching them closely they eat deer, rabbit, wolf coyote, fox, etc poop. You’d think they were eating steak they way they act if I tell them “leave it” - they gulp it down as fast as they can so I can’t “take it away”. They also drink swamp and puddle water. They never seem to get sick, but give our boxer a piece of sausage and the next day he’s off his food and has the poops! Who knows?! ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/7 "2017-05-11T21:32:52Z")
> [@TRC4941](#): > > …They also drink swamp and puddle water. They never seem to get sick, … Just a note about our generally lassaiz-faire attitude toward doggie fine dining: As a city dweller, I draw the line (i.e., freak) when he starts drinking puddles especially near the river or buildings, subways, whatever: rat piss in water carries lepto, and even the prophylactic shots don’t cover them all, and it’s a pretty strong fatal disease. ---
**Author:** ![Warm\_blood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/df705f/32.png) [@Warm\_blood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Warm_blood)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2017, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/8 "2017-05-11T23:10:12Z")
But why do they die if they eat chocolate or onions? ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2017, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/9 "2017-05-12T03:58:59Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > Just a note about our generally lassaiz-faire attitude toward doggie fine dining: As a city dweller, I draw the line (i.e., freak) when he starts drinking puddles especially near the river or buildings, subways, whatever: rat piss in water carries lepto, and even the prophylactic shots don’t cover them all, and it’s a pretty strong fatal disease. Being in the city, there could be antifreeze leaking from cars and getting into the puddles, too. Very bad for dogs. ---
**Author:** ![harmonicamoon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/65b543/32.png) [@harmonicamoon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/harmonicamoon)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2017, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/10 "2017-05-12T04:38:05Z")
A long, long time ago, I was in the school marching band. Dogs would love to eat the horse poop. They would clean up after the parades. Probably, it was where they got their pre-digested salad. Probably doesn’t happen nowadays. No stray dogs. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Duality](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.duality/32/4098_2.png) [@Mr.Duality](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Duality)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2017, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/11 "2017-05-13T14:01:59Z")
According to The Master, dogs eat poop just to gross out their humans. Sorry I don’t have time to look up the cite. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2017, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/12 "2017-05-13T16:49:49Z")
No cite, but “I read somewhere” that dogs specifically favor cat poo. Supposedly because domestic pussycats digestive systems don’t process their meat chow very efficiently, resulting in stools that are especially odoriferous. Smells like catshit to human people, but to an omnivorous dog it smells more like the meat that originally went into the cat. I’d really like to hear from someone who _knows_ whether or not this is accurate. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2017, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/13 "2017-05-13T20:16:01Z")
Certainly it is seen experimentally [in mice](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4703068/). Cohousing leads to microbiota transfer, at least presumptively through coprophagy (overt poop eating) and incidental fecal ingestion of others during grooming behaviors. Hence mice cohoused will have faster microbiota recovery from antibiotic-induced perturbations than those housed alone. A more [reasonable article](http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/everyone-poops-some-animals-eat-it-why-180961020/) about the behavior: > [@Smithsonian](#): > > … In fact, eating parental poop can also key for many young animals. Rabbits rely heavily on their parents’ poop as they begin to develop their own thriving microbiomes. “Before I was a veterinarian, I was a wildlife rehabilitator, and neonatal bunnies are some of the hardest animals to raise because mothers will feed their feces to the babies,” Becker tells me. “If you don’t have healthy feces to inoculate their digestive tracts, it’s very hard.” > > The same is true for panda cubs, which need to consume their parents’ feces in order to develop necessary microbes. We’re not always sure what those microbes are actually doing for the animals: “The jury is still out on whether [pandas’] gut biomes are digesting cellulose,” says Suen, who’s conducted research of his own on panda poop. Still, many zoologists say that infantile coprophagia is critical for many animals. For pandas, as with rabbits, eating their parents’ poop is “just a way for the young to gain access to those microbes that they would not have access to otherwise,” Suen says. > > When I asked Suen how such behaviors emerged in the first place, he acknowledged that we’re not really sure. He did, however, lay out a striking possible explanation: “Often, these microbes become very specialized and adapted. They become wholly dependent on their host,” he says. If they only live in specific species, the microbes gain “access to food, protection from predators, and so on.” That level of adaptation effectively compels the young animals reliant on these microbes to acquire them from adults, since they can’t find them elsewhere in nature. > > In other words, it might be that bacteria have inclined some animals toward coprophagia, creating a symbiotic loop where these higher animals can only thrive if they eat the excrement of their own kind. Such examples show that coprophagia can follow from a healthy—if complex—relationship between animals and their environments. Indeed, something similar may be true even for our dogs, however off-putting their behaviors may seem. As Becker puts it, “Animals are sometimes making decisions to consume poo for reasons that we haven’t always identified. It can be a kind of self-medication.” … Also in there is the tendency for animals to eat poop for incompletely digested foodstuffs contained (which I’ve heard is more common in dogs on grain high diets). ---
**Author:** ![Tibby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tibby/32/17030_2.png) [@Tibby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tibby)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2017, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/14 "2017-05-13T20:40:32Z")
My dog, Daisy, is a finicky pooch foodie and she most assuredly does not eat dog poop, thank you very much. She does, however, have a fondness for _cat_ poop. She raids our cat, Tibbys’ litter pan on a regular basis, and appears fit as a fiddle as a result. Poached cat poop on buttered toast drizzled with hollandaise sauce and a side of guacamole is not so bad…or, so I’ve been told. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2017, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/15 "2017-05-13T23:20:30Z")
Psstt…OP…you don’t want to give people ideas. What with [drinking one’s own urine](https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-29102/drinking-urine-is-the-new-health-trendbut-is-it-good-for-you.html) becoming a staple among the woo set, it might not be long before shit-eating turns into the next fad. Not other folks’ poop though, that’d be _disgusting_. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2017, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/16 "2017-05-14T00:03:07Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > … it might not be long before shit-eating turns into the next fad. … It must feel good to do it … why else would there be so many shit-eating grins? ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2017, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/17 "2017-05-14T03:08:19Z")
> [@Warm\_blood](#): > > But why do they die if they eat chocolate…? I almost think that’s a myth. The dog of a friend of mine once ate an entire Halloween bag of chocolate candy bars and the vet just shrugged and said “Well, keep an eye on him.” No medicine, stomach pumping, emetics, etc. The dog was fine afterwards. ---
**Author:** ![Pilgrim\_Shadow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Pilgrim\_Shadow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pilgrim_Shadow)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2017, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/18 "2017-05-14T06:06:15Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > I almost think that’s a myth. The dog of a friend of mine once ate an entire Halloween bag of chocolate candy bars and the vet just shrugged and said “Well, keep an eye on him.” No medicine, stomach pumping, emetics, etc. The dog was fine afterwards. My sister’s black lab stole and ate four bars bakers chocolate. It caused a minor panic until the dog barfed it all back up. If the dog didn’t barf it up, it might have been toxic. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2017, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/19 "2017-05-14T12:31:13Z")
> [@Warm\_blood](#): > > But why do they die if they eat chocolate or onions? [Old school SD Master speaks on chocolate … '95](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1153/is-chocolate-toxic-to-dogs) ---
**Author:** ![Tranquilis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tranquilis/32/3639_2.png) [@Tranquilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tranquilis)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2017, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dogs-gain-a-more-vibrant-gut-ecosystem-from-eating-poop/786315/20 "2017-05-15T15:46:19Z")
Dogs have rather robust stomach acids (as low as pH 2, or even less), which will among other thing do a number on bones - Most bacteria aren’t going to live long enough to make it to the gut. > **[Digesting Bones, Gastric Acidity, Salmonella in Dogs and Cats - Vet's All...](https://vetsallnatural.com.au/digesting-bones-gastric-acidity-salmonella-dogs-cats/)** > > There has been much debate about the “potential” dangers of feeding bones and raw meat to dogs and cats including from Salmonella. Find out our opinion here.