diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 96091081..af461ba2 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@
 - remove liboil dependency, we will use Orc instead
 - various small cleanups (thanks Tim)
 - add lcms2 support
+- VImage(filename) defaults to "rd" mode
 
 12/5/10 started 7.22.2
 - the conditional image of ifthenelse can be any format, a (!=0) is added if
diff --git a/libvipsCC/VImage.cc b/libvipsCC/VImage.cc
index ca3fc314..dff543a4 100644
--- a/libvipsCC/VImage.cc
+++ b/libvipsCC/VImage.cc
@@ -143,7 +143,7 @@ void VImage::refblock::removeref() throw( VError )
 		delete this;
 }
 
-// Init with name ... mode defaults to "r"
+// Init with name ... mode defaults to "rd"
 VImage::VImage( const char *name, const char *mode ) throw( VError )
 {
 	_ref = new refblock;
diff --git a/libvipsCC/include/vips/VImage.h b/libvipsCC/include/vips/VImage.h
index 35abbd51..b9d426c4 100644
--- a/libvipsCC/include/vips/VImage.h
+++ b/libvipsCC/include/vips/VImage.h
@@ -191,7 +191,7 @@ public:
 	 */
 
 	// Plain constructors
-	VImage( const char *name, const char *mode = "r" ) throw( VError );
+	VImage( const char *name, const char *mode = "rd" ) throw( VError );
 	VImage( void *data, int width, int height, 
 		int bands, TBandFmt format ) throw( VError );
 	VImage( _VipsImage *image );
@@ -202,8 +202,9 @@ public:
 	// 		"file.jpg", "temp.v" );
 	// Runs im_jpeg2vips to the temp file, then opens that and returns
 	// it. Useful for opening very large files without using a lot of RAM.
-	// Now superceeded by the format API, though that's not yet wrapped in
+	// Now superseded by the format API, though that's not yet wrapped in
 	// C++
+	// Also replaced by the new default "rd" mode
 	static VImage convert2disc( const char* convert, 
 		const char* in, const char* disc ) throw( VError );