The gizzard is why chickens do not need teeth. It is a muscular part of the stomach and uses grit (small, hard particles of pebbles or sand) to grind grains and fiber into smaller, more digestible, particles. From the gizzard, food passes into the small intestine, where nutrients are absorbed.

What is the purpose of gizzards?

The gizzard has a number of important functions, such as aiding digestion by particle size reduction, chemical degradation of nutrients and regulation of feed flow, and responds rapidly to changes in the coarseness of the diet.

How does the gizzard grind food?

In fact, a gizzard is an essential part of the chicken's digestion system. ... After sitting in the crop for a while, food trickles slowly into the gizzard, where muscles and small, hard particles like pebbles or sand, in conjunction with more digestive enzymes, grind up the chicken's food into digestible particles.