The trouble with Evan Buttigieg’s argument (Shouting the wrong facts, March 14) is that it rests on the belief that if a species is not yet in decline, then it must be alright to keep on killing it until it is.

Buttigieg appears to have a respect for facts that is not reflected in his awareness for evidence.

The fact is that 40 per cent of the world’s wildlife has disappeared in the last century.

The fact is that just about every species of birds is in decline, whether to a greater or lesser extent.

The fact is that, if one species is not disappearing as fast as another, it does not follow that this species does not face eventual extinction. It simply means that, although the extinction date is not as close as that of other species, it is there nonetheless.

Whether Buttigieg likes it or not, the fact is that neither turtle dove nor quail are increasing in numbers. In other words, the species are in decline and the fact that they are not yet about to disappear from the face of the earth is not a reason for him to shoot at them until they are.

In the circumstances, killing them randomly and wantonly during the breeding season is ecological vandalism.

As for his references to European Court of Justice judgments and the so-called facts that these were based upon, the ECJ today, in possession of more accurate data than that kindly provided by the hunting fraternity of the time, is inclined to take a far dimmer view of the entire issue than it did on previous occasions.