Tracking Poachers That Illegally Capture China's Protected Songbirds.

The activist's eyes scan across vast expanses of tall grassland, looking for signs of life in the pre-dawn darkness.

He speaks in less than a whisper as we try to find a concealed position in the open area. In the distance, the vast metropolis of Beijing slumbers on. As we wait, we hear only the quiet of the morning.

And then, as the sky begins to brighten ahead of sunrise, we hear footsteps. Illegal trappers are present.

Caught

In the skies above us, a multitude of winged travelers, many so small that they could rest in the cup of a hand, are journeying southward for winter.

They have taken advantage of the warmer months in northern regions, eating bugs and berries. As the year comes to a close and chilling gusts bring the early cold of winter, they head to warmer places to breed and eat.

There are over 1500 bird species, which is about thirteen percent of the world's total – over eight hundred of those are birds that migrate. Several of the major flyways they follow converge in China.

This particular field in question, on the fringes of the Chinese capital, is an oasis for small birds – any further and the urban landscape offer scant chance to rest among forests of concrete.

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

A net we almost encountered was stretched across a large section of the field and held up with wooden sticks. In the middle, a tiny bird was fighting hard to escape, but the more it moved, the more its claws became tangled.

It was a protected songbird, a species under protection in China, and an important "indicator species" – meaning if its population is healthy, so is its habitat.

Tracking the Trappers

This activist, performs this duty for free using his own savings. He has sacrificed many sleeping hours to set songbirds free, and he has spent the last 10 years persuading the police in Beijing to take this crime seriously.

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

So he gathered a team who were concerned and launched a group called the Bird Protection Unit. He held community gatherings and brought in the heads of the local police and forestry bureau. These consistent and determined acts of persuasion appear to have worked. The police realized that apprehending illegal hunters also led to tracking down other kinds of illegal operations.

"We found our goals were somewhat shared," Silva says, noting that enforcement is still patchy.

This fascination with birds began during childhood. He was raised in the nineties in a much changed capital.

He remembers roaming through the grasslands on the city's edges where he found birds, frogs and snakes. "But starting from the 2000s, everything changed."

Industrialization brought a huge influx of rural workers to cities. This expansion meant grasslands were seen as areas for development, not conservation areas to conserve.

This shift shocked him. The grasslands receded, as did the habitats they supported.

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

This has not made for an easy life. One of Beijing's biggest bird dealers discovered he was being investigated by Silva and fought back.

"He gathered several of his accomplices who surrounded me and beat me up," Silva remembers. He says he reported to the police but the perpetrators were not held accountable.

He has also lost his team of helpers over the years. This work demands stealth and sleepless nights. Silva says few people are willing to take on the challenging and occasionally risky job.

"My life is devoted to this," he says. "I made it a project because if you want to address this major issue, you must devote yourself wholeheartedly. You cannot be half-hearted."

He says fundraising covers some of the costs – over 100,000 yuan annually – but funding has declined because of the economic situation.

So he has adopted new ways to track the poachers.

He analyzes aerial photos to find the paths 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 netting setups which can catch hundreds of small birds during darkness.

"Siberian rubythroats and bluethroats command a premium," Silva says. "In big cities like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to own songbirds are now often affluent."

While there are wildlife laws in place, Silva believes the fines to punish the crime do not outweigh the potential profits of trapping and trading songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a status symbol. This originates from the imperial era. Wealthy individuals would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

It's a tradition that persists mainly among older individuals in their 60s or 70s. Silva says some elderly citizens may not understand they are committing a wildlife crime, or grasp that so many more birds were killed in a trap for them to purchase a pet.

"These individuals didn't even have enough to eat in their youth. 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 educate people about the environment. Once people's attitudes are set, they're really hard to change."

Busted

Along a riverside path in Beijing, a vendor has several small cages with chirping songbirds.

A separate individual stands outside a local market holding a bird cage shrouded in a dark cloth. He informs passers-by quietly that his songbird is valuable, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

This is a glimpse of an traditional side of the city where informal vendors have created their own market.

The area by the river stretches for several miles and on a typical day, there were shoppers browsing everything from old trinkets to dentures.

We were told that protected birds could be bought in a small park. The location was not concealed.

Music was blasting from a speaker under the low trees where a troop of elderly ladies were performing a traditional dance. Close by several men, all over 50, had gathered 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 appeared. They were questioning the bird owners and taking names. Unyielding, one man claimed he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his