What is an albino?

True albinos, like the white, pink-eyed rabbit pets, are born without any coloring matter in their bodies. An albino is a person born without any coloring matter or pigment, in his skin.  In such a person the skin is milky-white and the hair is very light.

A person who is a true albino also has pink eyes because the iris (the colored part of the eye) is so clear that the tiny blood vessels of the eye shines through.  In normal eyes, the color of the iris serves to hide the pinkness.

The color of our skin is chiefly due to the presence of a color pigment called “melanin,”  which gives the skin what we call “flesh color.”

When melanin accumulates in small spots in the skin, freckles appear.  And when you spend a few days in the sun, the sunlight darkens the melanin in your skin and this results in a “suntan.”

Albinism is found not only in man, but among all kinds of animals and birds, and it is even found in plants.  Perhaps the animal albinos we are all most familiar white mice and rats and rabbits that have pink eyes.

White ducks, chickens and horses are not true albinos, because most of them have color pigments in eyes, beaks or legs.-Dick Rogers