🔗 Share this article

The conservationist's eyes scan across miles of tall grassland, looking for suspicious activity in the pre-dawn darkness.

He speaks in less than a whisper as the team seeks a place of cover in the grasslands. Behind us, the huge urban center of Beijing remains asleep. As we wait, the only sound is our own breath.

Suddenly, as the sky starts to lighten ahead of sunrise, the sound of footsteps emerges. Illegal trappers are present.

Snared

Overhead, a multitude of winged travelers, some tiny enough that they can fit in the palm of your hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have taken advantage of the long summer days in Siberia, or Mongolia, feasting on bugs and berries. As the year winds down and chilling gusts bring the initial freeze of winter, they are flying to more temperate climates to find food and shelter.

China is home to more than 1,500 bird species, which is about thirteen percent of the planet's species – over eight hundred of those are migratory birds. Several of the major flyways they follow cross through China.

The patch of grassland in question, on the outskirts of the Chinese capital, is an oasis for small birds – any further and the urban landscape offer few options to rest among towering rows of concrete.

It is also an oasis for the poachers and their "mist nets", so thin you can almost miss them.

A net we almost encountered was strung across a large section of the field and held up with bamboo poles. In the middle, a meadow pipit was fighting hard to escape, but the more it struggled, the more its feet got ensnared.

This was a meadow pipit, a protected bird in China, and an important "bio-indicator" – that means if its population is healthy, so is its habitat.

Hunting the Hunters

This activist, carries out this mission for free using his own savings. He has forgone many sleeping hours to set songbirds free, and he has spent the last decade convincing the police in Beijing to take this crime seriously.

"Back in 2015, no-one cared," he says.

So he gathered a team who were concerned and established a group known as the Bird Protection Unit. He organized community gatherings and brought in the leaders of the relevant authorities. These consistent and determined acts of persuasion appear to have worked. The police found that catching poachers also helped in uncovering other kinds of illegal operations.

"It became clear our objectives became somewhat shared," Silva says, noting that the response is not uniform.

This fascination with birds began during childhood. He was raised in the nineties in a distinct era for the city.

He recalls exploring the fields on the city's edges where he found birds, frogs and snakes. "However, beginning in the 2000s, everything changed."

China's booming economy brought millions of rural workers to cities. This expansion meant grasslands were seen as areas for development, not protected zones to preserve.

The transformation was alarming. The grasslands receded, as did the ecosystems they sustained.

"I made the choice back then to dedicate myself to preservation and I followed this course," he says.

This has not made for an simple journey. One of Beijing's biggest bird dealers discovered he was under scrutiny by Silva and retaliated.

"He gathered several of his associates who confronted me and assaulted me," Silva recalls. He says he reported to the police but those responsible were not brought to justice.

He has also lost his army of volunteers over the years. This work requires covert operations and lost sleep. Silva says few people are prepared for the difficult – and sometimes dangerous job.

"This is my full-time commitment," he says. "I made it a project because if you want to tackle this challenge, you must give it your all. You cannot be half-hearted."

He says fundraising pays for some of the costs – over 100,000 yuan annually – but funding has declined because of the slowing economy.

So he has found new ways to hunt the hunters.

He studies aerial photos to find the routes created by the poachers. He maps those against the birds' flight paths and looks for areas where they may rest. The satellite images can even show netting setups which can capture scores of small birds during darkness.

"Certain prized species command a high price," Silva says. "In big cities like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to keep birds are now often affluent."

While there are environmental regulations in place, Silva reckons the fines to punish the crime do not exceed the financial benefits of catching and selling songbirds.

Owning a pet bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a mark of prestige. This originates from the Qing dynasty. Wealthy individuals would build ornate bamboo cages to display their birds.

This custom that persists mainly among older individuals in their 60s or 70s. Silva says some elderly citizens don't realise they are committing a wildlife crime, or understand that numerous birds had to die in a trap so they could buy a pet.

"These individuals often lacked enough to eat in their youth. Now with some disposable income, they have inherited the practice of caging birds," he says. "China developed so fast, there was little opportunity to raise awareness about ecology. Once people's attitudes are formed, they're really hard to change."

Apprehended

Along a riverside path in Beijing, a trader has several small cages with tiny twittering birds.

Another man stands outside a nearby market holding a bird cage shrouded in a black veil. He tells passers-by quietly that his songbird is valuable, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

This offers a view of an traditional side of the city where small unofficial traders have created their own market.

The path by the river extends over several miles and on a sunny weekday morning, there were shoppers browsing everything from old trinkets to false teeth.

Information suggested that wild songbirds could be purchased in a small park. It was easy to find.

Loud music played from a speaker in a shaded area where a troop of elderly ladies were performing a traditional dance. Nearby several men, all over 50, had congregated with bird cages – some had multiple in their hands. Most were covered in dark cloth.

But on this occasion there would be no sales because the police had arrived. They were questioning the bird owners and recording details. Unyielding, one man claimed he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his