Ostriches actually have two stomachs – the first one called a Gizzard is to grind the food and the second one to digest.  Ostriches have no teeth and hence one does not have to worry that when they peck at you that you will get hurt; and because they don’t have teeth they will deliberately eat little stones and pebbles to help with their digestion. At any one point in time you will find approximately 1, 5 kg of stones and pebbles in their Gizzard.

The Gizzard stones will grind the food to a fine consistency and are never excreted, but gradually wear away and will be replaced instinctively by the bird.  Ostriches are constantly looking for hard objects to swallow otherwise they will die. We, here at Safari Ostrich Farm, have found bones, golf-balls, spark-plugs, tins and glass, just to name a few items, inside their Gizzards. Ostriches are truly not fuzzy eaters.