ON April Fool's Day, this column heralded the discovery of a one-legged peewee colony at Robertson, prompting some very playful responses, as well as unearthing a few other interesting critters lurking in our bush, like the rare wingless flies in the Wingello wetlands.

Naturally they can't fly, so apparently the scientists are calling them walks.

Dave Sommers reckons you can often find one-legged peewees at Robbo, "near the seven-legged spider nest."

Another mate, Andy Frost, emailed to say one-legged peewees are common where he lives, "but they only lay two eggs, whereas a normal peewee usually lays four eggs."

Council's environmental officer, Joe Stammers well remembers the flabbit, a feathered, flying rabbit, but he hasn't seen a flabbit since the day his dad brought a picture home in the Daily Mirror one April Fools' Day in the 1980s, when he was a kid.

READERS also reminded me about the famous Burrawang Bunyip.

Everyone knows bunyips live in the Wingecarribee Swamp, problem is, there are a quite few different theories about this elusive animal and it all seems to turn on how much grog visitors to the swamp have had before they hear the distinctive roar.

Some describe the noise as a hollow roar, as loud as a bellowing bull.

Others talk of a kind of hooting "mump" that occurs at least five times in succession, "drawing its breath at the conclusion with a hoarse intake such as one might expect from a buffalo bull with the croup."

Talk with long time Burrawang residents and they will tell you there is a huge underground river between Lake Eyre and goodness knows where, that doesn't surface again until it passes under the Wingecarribee Swamp.

In that great cavernous river live many subterranean animals, including of course, the bunyip.

According to an extract from an old journal, it is recorded that; "a great amphibious animal, making its annual migration along this airless midnight channel, reared its prehistoric form from the depths of its watery lair once more, to bask in the sun and nightly roar its exultation."

WHICH brings me to the Oomedoodle bird.

An old school mate, Peter Richards, who has been sheep farming out Ilford way for years, has a colony of the rare Oomedoodle birds on his property.

These, according to Peter, don't have one leg, like the Robertson peewees, but they have no legs.

This legless variety of bird is so named because of the very distinctive call they emit every time they land, shrieking, "oomedoodle, oomedoodle," when coming down without any undercarriage to protect their nether regions, in this rather painful rock riddled terrain around Ilford.

PETER tells me the Oomedoodle bird is very intelligent and makes a great pet because it can talk much better than a parrot.

In fact, he reckons when passing a pet shop one morning, Dudley's wife, Grace, spotted an Oomedoodle bird in the window. There was a sign saying it was free, but also carried a warning about the bird's bad language.

Grace was accustomed to bad language around the farm and the Oomedoodle bird was beautiful, so she went into the shop.

"Yes it is indeed a beautiful bird, Grace," said the pet shop owner.

"Unfortunately it has lived most of its life in a brothel, so the language is pretty vulgar at times."

This didn't bother Grace, so she took it home and hung the cage in the lounge room, before making herself a cup of tea.

The bird looked around the room and chirped, "new house, new madam."

Grace was a bit shocked at the implications, but eventually laughed it off.

When Georgina and a pretty young girlfriend from university came home, the bird saw them and squawked, "Wow, new house, new madam, new girls."

Georgina and her friend had a bit of chuckle and sat down with Grace for a cup of tea.

A couple of minutes later Dudley came in from work.

The chirpy Oomedoodle bird looked up at him and said without blinking;

"G'day Dudley, haven't seen you for a few weeks."