Dear Elizabeth,
 
At 21:25 4-03-1998 EST, you wrote:
 
>I was wondering how to tell the difference between an albino shell and one
>which is just bleached?
>Also, how to tell if an albino of a particular specimen is a rarity, or
>common?
>I have searched in several field guides and encyclopedia but no answers...
 
There are many ways a shell can loose colour.
So, you can recognice an albino only when it is living in his population.
Then you see that the other shells does have their colours. When you see
only one species and you don't know the exact place of finding you never can
be sure it's an albino or an bleached one.
Or an albino is a rarety or common depends or the "normal" shells are rare
or common on one hand and how many albino's are in the population at the
other hand. (But you must first specify what you mean with rare and common,
because there are more ways to interpret those terms).