🔗 Share this article

Silva Gu's gaze sweeps across miles of open meadows, looking for any movement in the inky blackness.

He speaks in a muted voice as the team seeks a spot to hide in the open area. Behind us, the sprawling city of Beijing slumbers on. As we wait, the only sound is the sound of breathing.

Suddenly, as the sky starts to lighten before dawn, there is the crunch of footsteps. The hunters have arrived.

Caught

Across the heavens, billions of birds, many so small that they could rest in the cup of a hand, are migrating south for winter.

They have benefited from the warmer months in northern regions, feasting on bugs and berries. As the year comes to a close and icy winds bring the initial freeze of winter, they head to warmer places to find food and shelter.

There are more than 1,500 bird species, which is about 13% of the planet's species – over eight hundred of those are birds that migrate. Several of the major flyways they follow intersect in China.

The patch of grassland being monitored, on the edges of the Chinese capital, is an refuge for small birds – any further and the city skies offer little opportunity to rest among towering rows of concrete.

It is also an oasis for the poachers and their "barely visible nets", so thin you can barely see them.

The one we nearly walked into was extending over half the length of the field and supported with wooden sticks. At its center, a tiny bird was desperately trying to escape, but the more it moved, the more its claws became tangled.

This was a meadow pipit, a protected bird in China, and an important "indicator species" – meaning if its numbers are thriving, so is its ecosystem.

Hunting the Hunters

The conservationist, in his thirties, performs this duty for free using his own savings. He has sacrificed many sleeping hours to rescue birds, and he has spent the last decade convincing the police in Beijing to prioritize this issue.

"Initially, no-one cared," he states.

So he gathered a team who did care and launched a group known as the Beijing Migratory Bird Squad. He held public meetings and brought in the heads of the local police and forestry bureau. These small and persistent acts of persuasion appear to have worked. The police discovered that apprehending illegal hunters also led to identifying other kinds of illegal operations.

"We found our goals were somewhat shared," Silva says, while pointing out that implementation remains inconsistent.

Silva's love of birds started in childhood. He was raised in the nineties in a distinct era for the city.

He remembers wandering in the grasslands on the city's edges where he found birds, frogs and snakes. "But starting from the 2000s, the transformation was dramatic."

Industrialization brought a huge influx of rural workers to cities. This rapid urbanisation meant grasslands were seen as empty places to build, not conservation areas to conserve.

The transformation was alarming. The grasslands began to shrink, as did the wildlife they housed.

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

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

"He assembled several of his accomplices who surrounded me and assaulted me," Silva recalls. He says he reported to the police but the perpetrators were not brought to justice.

He has also seen the departure of his army of volunteers over the years. This work demands patience and night vigils. Silva says few people are willing to take on the challenging and occasionally risky job.

"I do this full-time," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to tackle this challenge, you must devote yourself wholeheartedly. 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 track the poachers.

He examines satellite imagery to find the trails worn away by the poachers. He charts these against the birds' flight paths and looks for areas where they may rest. The satellite images can even show lines of net traps which can capture scores of small birds at night.

"Certain prized species sell for a premium," Silva says. "In big cities like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to own songbirds are now quite wealthy."

Although there are wildlife laws in place, Silva reckons the penalties to punish the crime do not outweigh the potential profits of catching and selling songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a mark of prestige. This originates from the Qing dynasty. Nobles and elites would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

This custom that continues mainly among older individuals in their later years. Silva says older Chinese people may not understand they are breaking the law, or grasp that numerous birds were killed in a trap so they could buy a caged bird.

"This generation often lacked enough to eat growing up. Now with some disposable income, they have inherited the habit and custom of keeping birds in cages," he says. "The nation progressed so fast, there was little opportunity to raise awareness about the environment. Once people's attitudes are formed, they're really hard to change."

Apprehended

On a long low wall in Beijing, a trader has several small cages with chirping songbirds.

Another man is positioned near a nearby market holding a bird cage covered by a black veil. He informs passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth about 1900 yuan.

This is a glimpse of an old Beijing where informal vendors have created their own market.

The path by the river stretches for several miles and on a typical day, there were shoppers browsing everything from vintage jewellery to false teeth.

Information suggested that wild songbirds could be bought in a small park. The location was not concealed.

Loud music played from a speaker under the low trees where a troop of elderly ladies were choreographing a fan dance. Close by several men, all in their later years, had congregated with bird cages – some had multiple in their hands. Most were concealed by dark cloth.

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