I would like to point out that the butterfly featured in the back page photograph on October 16 was not a Swallowtail but a Painted Lady, also common in Malta, though nowhere near to what we used to see 30 years ago.

Car emission pollution does not only affect humans, as can be clearly seen. In my childhood days in the 1970s, we used to breed caterpillars of many types of butterflies in large jars to enjoy seeing them grow and transform into a pupa and then release them when they emerged as beautiful butterflies.

Nowadays, the sighting of caterpillars in the vicinity of Floriana/Pietà, despite the many gardens and the Pietà Pinetum, is a rare occasion and one would not dare collect them.