A rare pink albino bottlenose dolphin has been photographed in a US lake.
Skipper Erik Rue snapped the pink star of its pod in Calcasieu Lake, Louisiana, saying it looked like it had just come out of a paint booth.
"I just happened to see a little pod of dolphins, and I noticed one that was a little lighter," he was quoted as saying in the Daily Mail.
"It was absolutely stunningly pink."
The juvenile pink dolphin has become a star attraction for visitors and is believed to have taken up residence in the Calcasieu Ship Channel.
It sometimes strays from its mother but never swims too far away from its pod, according to Captain Rue.
Although a species of pink dolphin exists in the Amazon — Inia geoffrensis or pink Amazon River dolphin — this pink mammal is thought to be the world's only pink bottlenose dolphin. A senior biologist with the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, Regina Asmutis-Silvia, said she had never seen a dolphin that colour.
"While this animal looks pink, it is an albino which you can notice in the pink eyes," she was quoted as saying.
"Albinism is a genetic trait and it unclear as to the type of albinism this animal inherited."
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