In humans, these microbes help us break down fibrous plant materials found in beans, grains, and vegetables. Microbes break down food in our guts and produce gases like carbon dioxide or methane as a byproduct. That definition encompasses a wide range of biological processes.įor humans and our mammalian relatives, farts are mainly the result of digestion. They decided on a simple definition: Farts are simply gas that comes out of the end opposite the mouth, Rabaiotti says. Fun! Ethan Kocakįirst off, “fart” is not a scientific term, so Caruso and Rabaiotti had to decide what counts as one. 1) Farts take on many forms across the animal kingdom Rhinos do fart. Overall, Caruso hopes Does it Fart will help readers appreciate how “there’s still a lot that we don’t know, whether it be about farts or a lot of other aspects about biology,” he says.īut also: What we do know about farts is surprisingly wondrous. It comes out in the US on Tuesday, October 23. (The book was so successful, that the trio is publishing a sequel called True or Poo?: The Definitive Field Guide to Filthy Animal Facts and Falsehoods. “We just had a mutual interest in farts,” Caruso explains of why their collaboration worked. But inspired by the conversations in #DoesItFart on Twitter, they penned this book together and added cheeky illustrations by Ethan Kocak (see a few examples below). When writing Does it Fart, Caruso and Rabaiotti never actually met in person (Rabaiotti is based in the UK, Caruso in the US).

The tag became a forum for discussions on animals and whether they pass gas. Virginia Tech ecologist Nick Caruso saw the tweet and was inspired to create the hashtag #DoesItFart. But in early 2017, her brother asked her, “Do snakes fart?” and she didn’t know the answer.

It’s a small (133 pages), illustrated compendium of all things that toot from the rear.Įach page of the book is devoted to one animal and one question: Does it fart?ĭani Rabaiotti, a PhD zoology student at the Zoological Society of London and co-author of the book, studies how climate change impacts African wild dogs.

I learned this because I read Does it Fart? A Definitive Field Guide to Animal Flatulence, which published in April. Here’s a mind-boggling fact: Almost all mammals fart, yet the sloth does not.

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