Coprophagia

Coprophagia (/ˌkɒprəˈfeɪdʒiə/ KOP-rə-FAY-jee-ə) or coprophagy (/kəˈprɒfədʒi/ kə-PROF-ə-jee) is the consumption of feces. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek κόπρος kópros "feces" and φαγεῖν phageîn "to eat". Coprophagy refers to many kinds of feces-eating, including eating feces of other species (heterospecifics), of other individuals (allocoprophagy), or one's own (autocoprophagy). Feces may be already deposited or taken directly from the anus. Some animal species eat feces as a normal behavior, but in most species, coprophagia indicates a pathological condition.

Some carnivorous plants, such as pitcher plants of the genus Nepenthes, obtain nutrition from the feces of commensal animals. Notable examples include Nepenthes jamban, whose specific name is the Indonesian word for toilet. Nepenthes lowii has evolved interdependence with tree shrews which feed on the plants secretions from the pitcher lid then defecate in the plant's pitchers. In the case of N. Lowii, the pitchers have evolved a toilet like shape to accommodate tree shrews who feed on the waxy substance on the pitcher lid then defecate into the pitchers. Manure is organic matter, mostly animal feces, that is used as organic fertilizer for plants in agriculture.

Coprophagous insects consume and redigest the feces of large animals. These feces contain substantial amounts of semidigested food, particularly in the case of herbivores, owing to the inefficiency of the large animals' digestive systems. Thousands of species of coprophagous insects are known, especially among the orders Diptera and Coleoptera. Examples of such flies are Scathophaga stercoraria and Sepsis cynipsea, dung flies commonly found in Europe around cattle droppings.

Among beetles, dung beetles are a diverse lineage, many of which feed on the microorganism-rich liquid component of mammals' dung, and lay their eggs in balls composed mainly of the remaining fibrous material. Group living and aggregation among common earwigs promotes allo-coprophagy (consuming the feces of other members of one's own species) to promote the growth of helpful gut bacteria and provide a food source when food is scarce.

Through proctodeal feeding, termites eat one another's feces as a means of obtaining their hindgut protists. Termites and protists have a symbiotic relationship (e.g. with the protozoan that allows the termites to digest the cellulose in their diet). For example, in one group of termites, a three-way symbiotic relationship exists; termites of the family Rhinotermitidae, cellulolytic protists of the genus Pseudotrichonympha in the guts of these termites, and intracellular bacterial symbionts of the protists.

Lagomorphs (rabbits, hares, pikas) and some other mammals ferment fiber in their cecums, which is then expelled as cecotropes and eaten from the anus, a process called "cecotrophy". Then their food is processed through the gastrointestinal tract a second time, which allows them to absorb more nutrition. While cecotropes are expelled from the anus, they are not feces and thus eating them is not called coprophagia.

Domesticated and wild mammals are sometimes coprophagic.

Some dogs may lack critical digestive enzymes when they are only eating processed dried foods, so they gain these from consuming fecal matter. They only consume fecal matter that is less than two days old which supports this theory.