The sounds of gunfire yesterday were nothing like the barrage at daybreak on Monday. Maybe the weather had turned, or maybe Monday’s barrage killed the birds off.

We are now in the middle of the Spring hunting season. Every morning, people (mostly male) leave their comfy homes and beds in the middle of the night and travel to places where they then spend dawn and part of the morning scanning the skies, trigger at the ready.

Hunting (and trapping) is ingrained in the Maltese culture. Increasing numbers today shudder at the very concept itself – that some people derive pleasure from killing birds. But then some people (including King Juan Carlos) seem to derive pleasure from big game hunting. And what about fishermen?

Over the past years, bird hunting became a totemic and controversial pastime as it was dragged into the EU accession issue on the one hand and as increasing numbers both of Maltese and of visitors reacted in horror at the inroads that unbridled and uncontrolled hunting had made into the Maltese panorama. The result was roughly what Prohibition had caused in the United States – the more hunting was attacked, the more it attracted adherents.

At the same time, however, this, whatever we choose to call it – hunting, trapping, etc – brings such enthusiasts into close contact with nature in its pure state – the wide skies, the still remaining pockets of Maltese countryside, the changing patterns of the seasons.

Instead of pure repression, the right policy should be to encourage more people, beginning with schoolchildren, to learn to appreciate the wonders of nature.

This is, for instance, what is being done without any funds by the Park tal-Majjistral, that huge expanse of nature from Golden Bay to Anchor Bay, which includes garigue and rough shoreline, and an incredible amount of plants and flowers.

Schools should make it a point to take classrooms of students there at this time of the year when nature is in full bloom and where children can learn about the various indigenous plants that proliferate there. Today’s schoolchildren are growing up and only see cows and sheep when they see them on television.

This should not be construed as part of any anti-hunting campaign, nor should it be. In the case of birdlife, students must be taught to appreciate and love the various types of birds that nest in our islands (despite all the danger). The truth, whether hunters like to hear this or not, is that there is far more to learn to love and appreciate in birds than just at the end of a gun’s sights – nesting, breeding, mating, or in the opposite order.

We as a country should ask ourselves whether we are to continue with this sterile confrontation between pro- and anti-hunters, whether repression has worked and whether it is advisable for our student generation to grow up with no idea of what nature looks like. The future generations demand real answers from us.