Tracking Poachers That Illegally Capture China's Protected Wild Birds.

Silva Gu's gaze sweeps across vast expanses of tall grassland, looking for suspicious activity in the early morning gloom.

He utters a muted voice as they attempt to locate a concealed position in the grasslands. Behind us, the huge urban center of Beijing slumbers on. During the vigil, we hear only the quiet of the morning.

Suddenly, as the sky turns a shade lighter with the approaching day, there is the crunch of footsteps. Illegal trappers are present.

Caught

Across the heavens, countless migratory birds, many so small that they can fit in the palm of your hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have benefited from the long summer days in northern regions, consuming bugs and berries. As the year comes to a close and chilling gusts bring the initial freeze of winter, they are flying to more temperate climates to nest and feed.

China is home to over 1500 bird species, which is about 13% of the world's total – more than 800 of those are migratory birds. Several of the major paths they follow converge in China.

The patch of grassland where we were, on the outskirts of the Chinese capital, is an haven for small birds – farther in and the urban landscape offer scant chance to rest among clusters of concrete.

It is equally attractive for the poachers and their "mist nets", so delicate you can barely see them.

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

This 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.

Hunting the Hunters

This activist, does this work for free using his personal funds. He has forgone many sleeping hours to set songbirds free, and he has spent the last decade persuading the police in Beijing to enforce the law.

"In the early days, there was little interest," he says.

So he gathered a team who did care and formed a group called the Bird Protection Unit. He organized public meetings and invited the heads of the relevant authorities. These consistent and determined acts of advocacy have shown results. The police found that catching poachers also led to uncovering other kinds of criminal activity.

"We found our objectives became somewhat shared," Silva says, adding the caveat that enforcement is still patchy.

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

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

The transformation was alarming. The grasslands began to shrink, as did the habitats they supported.

"I made the choice back then to work in conservation and I followed this course," he says.

It has not been an easy life. A major Beijing's biggest bird dealers found out he was being investigated by Silva and fought back.

"He gathered several of his associates who confronted me and beat me up," Silva remembers. He says he reported to the police but the perpetrators were not brought to justice.

He has also seen the departure of his team of helpers over the years. This work requires patience and night vigils. Silva says few people are willing to take on the difficult – and sometimes dangerous job.

"This is my full-time commitment," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to address this major issue, you must commit completely. You can't do it part-time."

He says donations pays for some of the costs – more than 100,000 yuan a year – but support has waned because of the economic situation.

So he has found new ways to track the poachers.

He studies aerial photos to find the routes worn away 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 catch hundreds of small birds at night.

"Certain prized species sell for a premium," Silva says. "In urban centers like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to keep birds are now often affluent."

Although there are wildlife laws in place, Silva argues the fines to deter the activity do not exceed the potential profits of trapping and trading songbirds.

Owning a pet bird was – and for some people in China, still is – a status symbol. This originates from the imperial era. Nobles and elites would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

It's a tradition that continues mainly among older individuals in their 60s or 70s. Silva says some elderly citizens don't realise they are breaking the law, or grasp that so many more birds were killed in a trap so they could buy a pet.

"This generation didn't even have enough to eat in their youth. Now with some disposable income, they have adopted the habit and custom of caging birds," he says. "The nation progressed so fast, there was little opportunity to raise awareness about the environment. Once people's attitudes are set, they're really hard to change."

Busted

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

Another man is positioned near a local market holding a bird cage shrouded in a black veil. He informs passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

This offers a view of an old Beijing where informal vendors have established a niche trade.

The area alongside the water 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 nearby green space. The location was not concealed.

Loud music played from a speaker under the low trees where a group 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 black fabric.

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