‘There is no birdsong in the air’
This comment has just come in beneath my post from a couple of weeks ago about the hunting-related depredations that farmers have to endure.
Sent in by Juli:
I am delighted to read this article, for no other reason than it gives a voice to a Maltese national speaking out against the extent of hunting on these tiny islands.
This whole country is half the size the town I left to come and live in Malta (obviously I am not comfortable criticising anything when I have only lived here for two years) but the whole country appears held in captivity with these hunters.
There is NO BIRDSONG in the air. I cannot believe how that is acceptable?
As a nation you are distressed at the obesity levels, but no wonder, because no family can take to the countryside for recreation as there are people with shotguns everywhere.
Just because it is ‘tradition’ does not make it right, and unfortunately for Malta, which I love, you are on this occasion completely out of step with every other nation on the planet.
This is not going to go away, and unfortunately I see a future where campaigns will start to boycott Malta.
This is how seriously it is seen abroad. As for the new politicians, again as an outsider, I see a government jumping on the modern bandwagon, embracing all sorts of advanced thinking legislation like ivil unions etc (all to be commended) so this hunting barbarism, and it is barbarism, is so out of kilter, it almost doesn’t make sense.
No ‘young’ modern-thinking leader of a political party can view these hunters as anything other than an anachronistic barbarism. So what has happened? This Maltese government can have no credibly on the world stage.
Justify yourself to your European counterparts, and international counterparts, because if you wish for credibility then you must act.
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Hunting as a sport has been banned in Costa Rica for the past year.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/12/11/us-costarica-hunting-idUSBRE8BA04P20121211
Hunting is not and was never a “sport”. The wanton massacre of sentient creatures cannot classify as a sport especially today when repeater shotguns give no sporting chance to the hunted as was the case when bows and arrows, slings and falcons were the hunting weapons available.
In the days when hunter-gatherers hunted animals for food it was not a sport but a necessity and the hunters would only kill as much as they could consume or store. Shooting of God’s creatures — misrepresented as hunting — vernal or otherwise, is, in my view, a crime against nature.
Actually I was in the country today and had it all to myself. Been like that for a few weeks now. The spring season ended 30th April.
The lines:
Goodbye Michelle it’s hard to die
When all the birds are singing in the sky
were hardly inspired by the Maltese countryside
I really do fail to understand the point of juli’s comment.
It is haphazard, lacking in direction and without a plot. I use the word plot because it sounds like it is intended to be a bed time story.
Comments like this show how shallow the arguments are of those wanting trapping banned, please give me facts to be in favour of a ban.
If you really think that this comment is “haphazard, lacking in direction and without a plot” then you need your brain examined or have the blinkers removed.
Hear , hear . However you might have a problem finding his head……
You don’t need an argument to ban trapping. You need an argument to justify it.
Your move.
One of the birds on the endangered list due to spring hunting is the cuckoo.
I suppose that in Malta it is difficult to understand the relevance of the cuckoo’s call.
Abroad, it is part of the countryside. It is also part of the agriculturers’ landscape.
Part of the rhythm of the day, and of the seasons.
The “plot” is that stories of the sort you mention, and childhood memories in the country for all those Europeans who live in or visit the countryside, come to an end when the cuckoo’s call is no longer there.
It is haphazard, lacking in direction and without a plot. Mewho, to fully understand the comment you have to start reading from the top line right through to the bottom line. It is only then that you should get back to this site with more sense to your comments. Thanks.
There has not been birdsong in my neighbourhood for years. It has been replaced by the deafening noises of the huge machinery used for years on end in the construction industry as town house after another in the neighbourhood are pulled down to build cheap ugly high rise buildings full of rabbit hutches going by the name of flats, offices and penthouses.
I think that there should be a stop to all development.
Than you might start having bird song in your neighbourhood.
We should than divert all those employed in the building industry to accompanying the birds with their guitars.
The tourists would love it.
Joking apart, the best places to enjoy birdsong are London, Paris, New York.
The pity is that in all these places the birds seem to suffer from sore throats, owing to the fumes.
.
Anything to please you.
It is no coincidence that cruise ships of a certain calibre no longer visit Malta.