From yellow to black: everything you need to know about your baby’s stools

Your baby’s first stool is called meconium. This is formed by swallowing amniotic fluid in the uterus. It’s tacky, gooey and black in color – and you can’t smell it. Your baby should be producing this substance within 48 hours of birth.

If you are breastfeeding, your baby’s stools will soon turn a mustard yellow color. It is creamy or watery in texture and smells slightly sour. When bottle-fed, the stool is usually a bit thicker. Even then the stool is yellowish in color. Only when your baby starts eating solid food will the poop slowly turn brown in color.

How often does a baby poop?

This is hard to say, because no baby is the same. Just like adults, one person poops several times a day and the other only once every few days. Both are very normal. As long as your baby looks good, is drinking well and is passing stools well, there is nothing to worry about.

Normally, baby poop is quite thin and runny. It’s not for nothing that we sometimes call them ‘injection diapers’ when a baby produces a lot of faeces in one go and the substance can sit up to its neck… As your baby gets older, the structure changes to a more solid form.

Make sure that the stool does not become too dry or thick, because then you may be constipated. Too thin or very watery is the other extreme, then your baby may have diarrhea.

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When should you be alert to your baby’s stools?

As mentioned, the color of the stool in a healthy baby goes from black to yellow and finally brown. But red or greenish can also occur. Is there any immediate reason to panic? New. Often it simply has to do with the food your baby has eaten. However, with some colors you have to be alert, because then there may be something wrong.

We list the different colors of baby stools for you:

green stool

Children and adults have some greenish stools if they have eaten spinach, for example. Your baby will not get this at a young age, but his poop can still be green in color – especially if your baby is bottle-fed. This is because there is added iron in formula.

Even if your baby starts teething after a few months, stools may be greenish in color.

Orange stool

Once your baby starts taking the first bites of fruits and vegetables, such as carrots, you may find some orange poop in his diaper. But dyes and medicines in your breast milk can also be the cause.

red stool

Unless your baby has had beetroot, watch out for reddish stools. It could be that your baby has a tear in his anus, but it could also be a bleeding in his stomach or intestines. A call to the doctor is therefore wise.

White or gray stools

Also with this color it is best to consult your doctor, because white or gray stools usually indicate a problem with the liver or bile ducts.

brown stool

This is where your baby will eventually go; the more solid food he eats, the browner his stool will become. And an additional advantage: the smell is a bit more tolerable than the first few months.

Source: Pregnancy Portal, La Leche League

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