IT was a little hasty for someone recently to jump in and try to take Ron Freethy down a peg, when anyone can make a mistake between 'former' and 'latter.'

This doesn't indicate a lack of knowledge regarding a subject, just a slip of the pen, so to speak.

In another direction, it can be easy for an expert to appear to be wrong when quoting certain reports. Take Ron's article, 'More species are facing extinction' (LET, January 6).

Like him, I read the WWF UK's report on species under threat and, as Ron wrote, concerning the short-haired bumble-bee being extinct, it was last seen in the Dungeness areas two years ago.

Another report said that it has just been discovered that its natural foraging plant is the red clover. This, too, like white clover, is getting very scarce.

This particular report said that for a species to be declared extinct, it has to be unseen for five years.

This bumble-bee's name, incidentally, is a new one to me - Bombus subterraneous. Can this be a name-change, as is happening all the time. We beekeepers just can't keep up with the changes.

ALBERT J MORRIS, Clement View, Nelson.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.