The Colors Of Poop
Why is my poop brown?
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Why is my poop brown? – Ethan J., age 9, Potomac, Maryland
Three-quarters of your poop consists of water and most of the rest is food your body didn’t digest.
Once it exits the digestive system, poop is usually a shade of brown, regardless of the appearance of whatever you’ve had to eat and drink, because it contains a chemical your body makes.
That chemical, stercobilin, is a product of the breakdown of hemoglobin – an iron-containing protein in red blood cells that allows oxygen to be transported around the body. Without sercobilin, your poop would probably look pale or even white. That’s because most of t...