Microscope

[Diane]

Any ideas on a good but not expensive microscope? Also what size magnification would be needed to do fecal smears?

[Buzzard-1]

Depends on your eyesight the kids one is not good enough believe me I think it's X16 max

[Diane]

From what I have been reading it seems like 400x or higher is needed but if you go 1000x then you start getting into needing oil to be able to read the slides.
Trouble is, the ones on ebay are written like this

New Medical Veterinary Biology Microscope Mag 40X～640X
Magnification：40X～640X

monocular vertical tube Binocular XSP-02
made of metal and glass

Hugens Eyepiece: H10X H16X
Achromatic Lenses: 4x 10x 40x (s)
monolayer flatroof: 110mm × 120mm
Gate plat: φ2.8-φ15 five aperture
Coarse adjustment range：50mm

Fine adjustment range:1.8mm-2.2mm
illumination：Concave-plan reflector 50mm dia.

so Im not sure if thats good or bad.
My research has popped up another few questions, should it have a light, a platform, a camera, one eyepiece or two?
Got to watch where they are located too!
This is worse than when I wanted to buy binoculars

[jusdeb]

You may need to look at medical / laboratory equipment suppliers .

[Diane]

Trouble is with them its usually arm and leg cost!

All this just to look at some poop! Ah well Ill keep looking, no hurry, after all they arent going to run out of poop
You never know I might get lucky and get a second hand one that will do the job. Might be worth a call to the uni.

[jusdeb]

Ex school or Uni lab equipment ....where do they auction them off at ?

[Diane]

Not sure, there is a Government auction place close to the city, I know they sell ex Government cars there. There is also Pickles at Salisbury, they have auctions, but again mainly cars. Got me thinking now, time to read the Saturday and Sunday papers I reckon, loads of auction houses in there with different categories.

[MadHatter]

As I recall ,you generally have a 10x eyepiece and a set of 4x, 10x & 40x or 10x, 40x & 100x lenses. So, 40x lens + 10x eyepiece = 400x magnification. Or 100x lens + 10x eyepiece = 1000x magnification, but keep in mind that 100x lenses are oil immersion.
You should definitely get one that has it's own illumination lamp. Those old-fashioned ones with the mirror are a pain in the a**.

[monotwine]

I'm also interested in finding a microscope for home use.

When I asked my avian vet he said 200x - 250x is ample for fecal smears and you would get by on 100x.

I'm still a bit sketchy on what kind of microscope to use though. Top lighting, bottom lighting, medical / lab type microscopes. As I understand it they are different. I would have thought a microscope was a microscope, but no apparently not. First hand here is frightfully expensive and I just don't come across second hand ones.
I've used a laboratry microscope to look at fecals here at work and it shows what I think I need to see. one of those with two eyepieces and zoom/focus with top and bottom lighting, no rotational lenses with a solid base, unlike the one my vets uses.

So I am interested to see what others recommend.

[Myzomela]

I agree with Madhatter.
You need at least 400 x magnification if you're trying to see small coccidia or yeast. The 1000x is even better but not essential. Lower magnifications may be ok if you're experienced but it's important as a novice to be able to see things up close to distinguish parasite eggs from air bubbles, urate crystals and bits of digested plant material.

Yes, you need 2 eyepieces and its own lightsource. The reality is if you can't see anything properly you won't use it!

So you need to have someone show you how to use the microscope properly- an avian vet would be best or someone experienced with a microscope & using it for birds.

Otherwise it's hard just looking down the scope and trying to separate the rubbish from the stuff you're looking for- even with a helpful book like DannY Brown's microscope guide.

New, these sorts of microscopes start at $900-1000 +, and these are for the cheaper Chinese models.

So if you can get a second hand one as suggested, that would be much cheaper. Try e-bay, local universities/tafes, hospitals, diagnostic labs, doctors or vets.

So what you are looking for is a "binocular" microscope- 2 eyepieces; with 4x, 10x, 40 X ( and/or 100x) objectives and built-in lightsource.