The Ultimate Color Guide to Your Baby’s First Poops

Here’s a secret: Nobody likes a poopy diaper. Not even your tough-as-nails partner who secretly gags during changes but never admits it. Your secret weapon? Knowledge. Here’s the Fatherly Color Guide to Your Baby’s First Poops. Soon, you’ll be an unflappable master of crap.

Their first poops, which are also called meconium, are brownish-green and super sticky. They contain swallowed amniotic fluid as well as the little hairs and waxy coating that protected your kid in the womb.

Between months 2 and 4, things get a little bit more colorful. That color will be different based on whether your kid is breastfed or formula fed. In general, their cute little feculence is a shade of mustard-y taupe, but a bit darker for formula kids. The color of Grey Poop-on, perhaps. Breastfed baby’s stool smells “sweeter” than a formula fed baby’s. But both are somewhat grainy and loose with little milk-fat curds.

Once you’ve started giving the kid mashed banana or other kinds of solid food, their poop will change. The biggest difference will be in color as their crap takes on a hue more familiar to what you’re used to: brown.

Soon, it’s on to toddler turds. Sadly, this is when the mushy stools are going to get more solid and loaf-like, and the smell starts really becoming a factor. There are circumstances when your kid’s poop is cause for actual concern. If you open the diaper and see a white, black, or even a red poop, get the pediatrician on the phone.