Betta eyes

Question
Hi Jaymie,
I'm hoping you can help us out. We have a male beta ho is in a 17 liter tank with a filter, by himself. The water is heated to 80 degrees, and he eats pellets (2) or tetra flakes (2-3) once daily, on alternating days. We have had him almost six months and he has been a trooper. Just tonight we noticed he has a white spot on each eye. He is still active and eating the same as always. Could it be a disease? I have read other responses on here and wonder about pop eye? I dont like using chemicals if not needed. Please advise , thanks so much for your time.

Answer
Chris,
When a fish has popeye, the eye is looks like it is literally popping out of its head. It could be the start of popeye though. I also do not put chemicals in ,y Betta tanks. The first thing to do is a 40% water change. In the clean water going into the tank, add some dissolved aquarium salt. The ratio is 1 teaspoon of aquarium salt to 1 gallon if water. It is important to remember that the salt is ONLY being add to the clean conditioned water going into the tank. Since it is hard to figure out how much salt to put in if you are not sure how much water you are taking out, the following is an easy way to do it. Since aquarium salt is relatively inexpensive, I suggest removing 1 gallon of water during the water change. This will ensure that you are not adding too much salt to his tank. Continue to do weekly water changes adding the salt to the new clean water. You will also have to remember that salt does not evaporate, and once your fish is healthy again you will have to remove the salt from his water. You can do that by doing 25% water changes daily for 5 to 6 days. After this time, there should be no more salt in the water.