Thank you Liz, for another excellent Flight magazine. Full of interest. It’s always been a strong point of DUNZ.

I particularly enjoyed the Whio News 2015 (page 14) and the “Ghost flow” photo of the whio of very pale colouring that had set up on the Whakapapanui. Peter Russell will have been well aware, but I think it’s worth mentioning that the bird is of the leucistic colour phase. Leucism is an abnormal plumage condition, caused by a genetic mutation that prevents pigment, particularly melanin (which produces black), from being deposited in a bird’s feathers. It occurs also in Black swan (personal comment Ken Meirs). It occurs too in animals. I treasure a photo I took many years ago of this leucistic chamois (right) which had been netted in the Waiau river country.

Howard Egan.