Hunting - figures, facts and concerns

The trigger-happy season is with us once again and with it the controversy as to whether hunting should be allowed or restricted. Each argument is fuelled by a counter-argument and it will not be pertinent here to seek to identify the merits or demerits of each.

If one is to arrive at a compromise of some sort, concrete reasons must be established so as to strengthen the arguments one might have. This before the trenches are dug deeper and deeper.

Feeding the public with outlandish arguments will, unfortunately, serve for nothing bar to heighten pique between the parties concerned.

Hunters, for example, claim their right to hunt whereas anti-hunting bodies claim their right to the countryside without having to be threatened by men in war gear, brandishing shotguns about and shooting indiscriminately.

The facts are that hunters have a right to hunt, albeit in a restricted and legal manner, and the anti-hunting campaigners might be somewhat exaggerating their claims.

The truth is that if every hunter were to abide by the laws of the country and to hunt only those birds allowed by law, to have only two cartridges in the barrel at any one time, to shoot only beyond 200 metres from any dwellings, built-up areas and public roads, to hunt only during the hunting season, then perhaps the anti-hunting lobby might not be so vociferous in its protest.

The hunting versus anti-hunting conflict is not restricted to Malta but is alive and well in many other developed countries; in Malta it might be more evident for a number of reasons.

The primary reason is that hunters have had it good for far too many years, shooting indiscriminately at anything and at any time of the year. Up to some years ago even shooting at road-signs was considered a sport.

The secondary reason is the small size of our country. In Italy, for example, the latest figures show that 800,000 hunters still practise this sport.

In down-to-earth figures, when comparing the population, area and hunters in both Italy and Malta and, let us for the sake of argument, forget that Malta is more densely built up than Italy, let us assume that both countries afford the same non-built-up areas in a relative manner.

The figures

Malta
population: 395,000
area: 316 sq km
hunters: 12,000

Italy
population: 57,635,000
area: 312,000 sq km
hunters: 800,000

The figures above are for the number of licensed Maltese hunters. It is estimated by various organisations that the true total number of hunters could well be over 30,000.

From these figures we may develop the following. There is one hunter for every 26.3 sq metres of Maltese territory. One in every 33 persons is a hunter, whereas there is one hunter for every 390 sq metres of Italian territory. One in every 72 persons is a hunter.

Let us now examine another fact. Hunting cartridges usually come in one of three gauges, namely 12, 16 and 20. These cartridges carry an amount of leadshot varying between 24 g and 32 g.

It would therefore be safe to assume that on average, the lead in hunting cartridges would weigh 28 g per cartridge. This is to say that with every shot 28 g of lead are sprayed onto our countryside.

If one were to take the extremely conservative figure that each hunter manages only 200 shots per annum this would mean that each hunter would be spraying 5.6 kilos of lead onto his allotted 23.6 sq metres.

In Italy those same 5.6 kilos of lead would be distributed over a much wider area, namely 390 sq metres. This shows how serious the situation in Malta is becoming.

We have 12,000 hunters in Malta. If each hunter shot 200 cartridges per annum we would have the following formula:

Twelve thousand (hunters) by 200 (shots) by 28 g (per shot) totals 67.2 million grams of lead falling all over our island. That is 67,200 kilos overall or 212.6 kilos per square kilometre of our fair land.

Assuming one were to really get anxious, try limiting this shower to the countryside and avoid built-up areas and increase the number of hunters to those estimated, i.e. 30,000, and one would now be faced with this formula:

Thirty thousand (hunters) by 200 (shots) by 28 g (per shot) totals 168 million grams of lead falling all over our island. Now consider that open countryside is around 70 per cent of the total area of the island. This means that 168,000 kilos actually fall in an area that is 70 per cent of 316 sq km

Formula: (316 x 70 per cent)
= 221 sq km
= 168,000 kilos of lead shot divided by 221 sq. km
= 760 kilos per sq. km
= 760 grammes per sq. metre

We have a mere 221 sq km of land on which to concentrate this shower of 168,000 kilos, therefore 760 kilos of lead fall on each square kilometre of our countryside, our crops and our food.

None of this lead is wasted, however; what remains seeps into our water table, so what we don't eat, we drink and this is taking place on a daily basis, year after year.

Over these last ten years alone, 7,600 kilos or 7.6 tons of lead have fallen onto each square kilometre of our countryside. This is a worrying thought, to say the least, particularly because 200 shots a year per hunter is a very, very conservative figure.

To start with, lead is a poison and it is certainly not good to absorb it into our system on a daily basis. We know that food can be contaminated with lead when it is grown in soil with a high lead content and even green leafy vegetables may absorb lead from soil where exposure is high.

Lead eventually finds its way to our water table so the crops get a second helping of lead through irrigation. As if that were not enough, with a contaminated water table, even the water we drink would contain lead.

Lead is very toxic and has the tendency to accumulate in the body. Lead poisoning, for example, may cause cognitive and growth defects in infants whose mothers are exposed to lead during pregnancy and there is currently no lead level believed to be safe for infants and young children.

In lead poisoning, there is a silent progression of nonspecific symptoms that makes it difficult to detect. Irritability, stomach ache, diarrhoea, colic, distractibility and lethargy are all symptoms of progressive lead accumulation. Higher levels or chronic exposure result in more severe symptoms such as kidney and nervous system damage.

Should we be concerned?

We definitely should. Our countryside is absorbing tons of lead on an annual basis and we do not know exactly what damage this is causing to our health.

Meanwhile NGOs such as Greenpeace (Malta), seemingly unable to come up with issues that are their own, copy their master's voice and battle Maghtab and the chimney stacks at St Luke's Hospital.

BirdLife seem to be more concerned about the life of a bird than our own, their own, while the hunters, seemingly oblivious to the damage they are causing to the environment, now expect to be identified as environmentalists.

Epidemiological studies show that those exposed to even low levels of lead may have a lower IQ, learning disabilities and behavioural abnormalities, apart from kidney damage.

One must question whether lead poisoning in Malta has already reached intolerable proportions.