Fecal Testing Equipment

• A microscope
• A microscope slide
• A mixing vial
• Fecal flotation fluid
• Pictures of the normal parasites associated with goats
• A syringe, pipette, or eye dropper

Here is a site that has most of these items. Precision Chambered Counting Slides. This is the only place I have found for ordering the McMaster Egg Counting slides. They also have a complete kid that includes the slides, mixing vial, syringes and document on useage.

• Needs to have 100 times magnification.
• One eyepiece is all that is required. There are Binocular microscopes with two eyepieces but it is not required. We have a binocular microscope but only use one eyepiece. If I were buying a new microscope, I would not get one with two eyepieces again.
• It is nice to have a microscope that has its own light source. Some cheaper microscopes do not plug into electricity to allow a light source for viewing the slides. They have a mirror that you adjust to focus room light into the microscope. The better the lighting, the better the viewing. Get one that has its own light source.
• Mechanical stage: A mechanism mounted on top, or as part, of the stage that allows the operator to move the specimen slide in the X or Y direction by turning a knob. Very useful at higher magnifications as it can be difficult to move the slide by hand otherwise since it must be moved such a small amount. Also, moving by hand can be difficult since you must move it in the opposite direction. If you will be using a fecal counting slide and will be counting eggs, it is important that your microscope have a mechanical stage.

You need a slide to view your fecal samples. It can be just a basic slide but I would recommend that you get a special slide designed just for counting fecal eggs.

You will need some type of a vial for measuring a required amount of fecal flotation fluid and adding a specific amount of fecal material. When the fecal material material is added to the fluid, you will need to break down the pellets in the fluid until it is in a more liquid form allowing the fecal eggs to float in the fluid. The McMaster Egg Counting Kit has two vials in it for this purpose. The vials have markings to show how much flotation fluid to add and then how much fecal samples to add.

This fluid is required to allow the fecal eggs to float in the liquid. There are some "ready to use" flotation fluids that you can purchase or you can create your own. At this time, we are using a purchased flotation fluid but will be comparing our results with some of the mix-it-yourself fluids. We are currently using a Fecal Float Sodium Nitrate solution we purchased. A saturated sugar fluid is prepared by dissolving a pound of sugar in 12oz (1 1/2 cups) of water. Saturated salt fluid takes a pound of salt in 38.5 oz (4 4/5 cups) of water.. I found the ready-to-use fluid at www.petsupplies4less.com

Here are some parasite eggs we have found while analyzing fecal samples.

Stomach Worm	Coccidia	Common Thread Worm	Double-pored Tapeworm

You need some way of getting a small amount of the fecal sample fluid out after mixing the sample into the float fluid and putting it on the slide. The McMaster Egg Counting Kit has two syringes in it for this purpose.