How to Remove the eyes of your Betta Fish

I've often been asked this question, how do you remove a betta fish's eyes? Well, it's actually quite simple. I'll tell you how. I will warn you though that it can severely injury the fish and it can cause bleeding.

Here's the easiest way to remove the eyes. First, I push the fish around the tank with a plastic fork or something like that so it will get tired. Finally, the fish stops reacting / moving as much so I know it's ready for the next step.

Next, I take the fish out of the tank and put it on a flat surface. I hold the fish down with one hand. With another I take a toothpick and poke at it's eye. At first, the fish may flip over a few times as this is painful for it, but it will soon stop doing this.

As I'm poking at it's eye, I try to "dig" the eye out of it's socket. This can be hard to do and requires practice to get it right. You'll know when you got it right when you put the fish back in the tank, wave your hand, and it doesn't have any reaction. That means you have succeeded and the eye is no longer working.

So, I usually flip the fish over at this point and remove the other eye. Sometimes loosening the eye from it's socket is enough to stop it from working, and sometimes you need to fully remove it.

Now, I put the fish back in the water and it is totally blind. What does it do? It normally stays towards the top of the tank/bowl and breathes air every now and then.

Of course, it would eventually starve because the betta fish can no longer see its food. I don't know if it would work if you somehow put the food into its mouth? Any suggestions on this point are welcome.

One thing to remember is that the fish will be somewhat weak, as you have removed two eyes, so it won't move that much.

One thing I have been experimenting with is taking a newly blind betta fish and putting it in a tank with a normal, healthy betta fish. Theoretically, the healthy betta fish will see the blind betta fish, but not vice versa, and the blind betta fish will get attacked without knowing why.

Well, that's it, I hope this clarifies for you how to remove the eyes from a betta fish! If you try it, let me know how it works out for you!

One thing I am interested in is, how to remove a betta fish's eyes while still keeping the fish relatively healthy? If you know how to do this, please send me a message. Thanks.