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Silva Gu's vision darts over vast expanses of open meadows, hunting for suspicious activity in the early morning gloom.

He utters less than a whisper as the team seeks a concealed position in the open area. In the distance, the huge urban center of Beijing has yet to wake. As we wait, the only sound is the sound of breathing.

And then, as the sky turns a shade lighter ahead of sunrise, we hear footsteps. The poachers are here.

Caught

In the skies above us, a multitude of winged travelers, some tiny enough that they can fit in the cup of a hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have utilized the long summer days in Siberia, or Mongolia, feasting on insects and fruit. As the year winds down and chilling gusts bring the early cold of winter, they are flying to more temperate climates to find food and shelter.

China is home to 1500-plus bird species, accounting for 13% of the planet's species – over eight hundred of those are migratory birds. Several of the major flyways they follow converge in China.

The area of meadow being monitored, on the outskirts 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 "fine nets", so thin you can almost miss them.

The trap we stumbled upon was stretched across a large section of the field and supported with bamboo poles. At its center, a meadow pipit was fighting hard to free his legs, but the more it moved, the more its claws became tangled.

It was a protected songbird, a protected bird in China, and an important "bio-indicator" – that means if its numbers are thriving, so is its environment.

Tracking the Trappers

Silva, who is in his 30s, does this work for free using his own savings. He has given up on many sleeping hours to release trapped birds, and he has spent the last 10 years convincing the police in Beijing to enforce the law.

"Initially, there was little interest," he remarks.

So he enlisted helpers who were concerned and formed a group called the Beijing Migratory Bird Squad. He held public meetings and brought in the leaders 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 criminal activity.

"We found our objectives became somewhat shared," Silva says, noting that implementation remains inconsistent.

This fascination with birds started in childhood. He was raised in the 1990s in a much changed capital.

He recalls roaming through the grasslands on the city's edges where he discovered birds, frogs and snakes. "However, beginning in the 2000s, the transformation was dramatic."

Industrialization brought millions of rural workers to cities. This fast-paced development meant grasslands were considered empty places to build, not sanctuaries to conserve.

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

"I decided back then to pursue environmental protection and I followed this course," he says.

It has not been an simple journey. A major Beijing's biggest bird dealers discovered he was being investigated by Silva and retaliated.

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

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 solve this big problem, you must devote yourself wholeheartedly. You can't do it part-time."

He says fundraising covers some of the costs – more than 100,000 yuan annually – but donations have dipped because of the slowing economy.

So he has adopted new ways to hunt the hunters.

He analyzes aerial photos to find the trails created by the poachers. He maps those against the birds' migratory routes and looks for areas where they may stop for the night. The satellite images can even show netting setups which can capture scores of small birds at night.

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

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

Owning a pet bird was – and for some generations in China, still is – a mark of prestige. This dates back to the imperial era. Nobles and elites would build elaborate bamboo cages to display their birds.

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

"These individuals often lacked enough to eat in their youth. Now with some disposable income, they have adopted the habit and custom of caging birds," he says. "China developed so fast, there was little opportunity to raise awareness about ecology. Once adults' values are formed, they're extremely difficult to change."

Apprehended

On a long low wall in Beijing, a vendor has several small cages with tiny twittering birds.

A separate individual stands outside a local market holding a bird cage shrouded in a black veil. He tells passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth about 1900 yuan.

This is a glimpse of an old Beijing where small unofficial traders have created their own market.

The path alongside the water extends over several miles and on a typical day, there were people looking at everything from vintage jewellery to dentures.

Information suggested that protected birds could be purchased in a small park. The location was not concealed.

Music was blasting from a speaker in a shaded area where a troop of elderly ladies were choreographing a fan dance. Nearby several men, all in their later years, had congregated with bird cages – some had multiple in their hands. Most were covered in dark cloth.

But today there would be no transactions because the police had appeared. They were questioning the bird owners and taking names. Defiant, one man claimed he was {taking his caged bird for a walk|simply exercising his