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Silva Gu's eyes scan across miles of dense fields, hunting for any movement in the inky blackness.

He utters less than a whisper as the team seeks a concealed position in the fields. In the distance, the sprawling city of Beijing remains asleep. During the vigil, we hear only the sound of breathing.

Suddenly, as the sky turns a shade lighter before dawn, we hear footsteps. The poachers are here.

Caught

In the skies above us, billions of birds, some tiny enough that they can fit in the palm of your hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have utilized the extended daylight in Siberia, or Mongolia, feasting on insects and fruit. As the year winds down and chilling gusts bring the initial freeze of winter, they are flying to southern locales to nest and feed.

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. Four of the nine major flyways they follow cross through China.

The area of meadow where we were, on the edges of the Chinese capital, is an oasis for small birds – farther in and the urban landscape offer few options to rest among forests of concrete.

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

The one we nearly walked into was extending over a large section of the field and propped up with bamboo poles. At its center, a meadow pipit was struggling frantically to free his legs, but the more it moved, the more its feet got ensnared.

This was a meadow pipit, a species under protection in China, and an important "bio-indicator" – that means if its population is healthy, so is its ecosystem.

Tracking the Trappers

This activist, performs this duty for free using his personal funds. He has sacrificed many nights of sleep to release trapped birds, and he has spent the last 10 years convincing the police in Beijing to prioritize this issue.

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

So he enlisted helpers who were concerned and established a group called the Beijing Migratory Bird Squad. He held community gatherings and invited the leaders of the local police and forestry bureau. These small and persistent acts of advocacy have shown results. The police realized that catching poachers also led to uncovering other kinds of criminal activity.

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

This fascination with birds began during childhood. He grew up in the 1990s in a very different Beijing.

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

Industrialization brought a huge influx of rural workers to cities. This expansion meant grasslands were considered empty places to build, not protected zones to conserve.

This shift shocked him. The grasslands receded, as did the wildlife they housed.

"I decided 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 found out he was under scrutiny by Silva and fought back.

"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 held accountable.

He has also seen the departure of his army of volunteers over the years. This work requires covert operations and lost sleep. Silva says not many are prepared for the difficult – and sometimes dangerous 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 a year – but donations have dipped because of the slowing economy.

So he has adopted 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 stop for the night. The satellite images can even show lines of net traps which can catch scores of small birds during darkness.

"Certain prized species command a high price," Silva says. "In urban centers like Beijing and Tianjin, those who want to own songbirds are now quite wealthy."

While there are wildlife laws in place, Silva argues the penalties to deter the activity do not exceed the potential profits of catching and selling songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some people in China, still is – a mark of prestige. This dates back to the imperial era. Nobles and elites would build ornate bamboo cages for their birds.

It's a tradition that persists mainly among older individuals in their 60s or 70s. Silva says older Chinese people may not understand they are breaking the law, or grasp that so many more birds were killed in a trap so they could buy a caged bird.

"These individuals didn't even have enough to eat growing up. Now with some disposable income, they have adopted the habit and custom of keeping birds in cages," he says. "China developed so fast, there was no time to educate people about ecology. Once adults' values are formed, they're really hard to change."

Busted

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

A separate individual stands outside a nearby market holding a bird cage shrouded in a dark cloth. He tells passers-by discreetly that his songbird is rare, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

This offers a view of an traditional side of the city where small unofficial traders have established a niche trade.

The path alongside the water stretches for several miles and on a typical day, there were shoppers browsing everything from old trinkets to dentures.

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

Loud music played from a speaker under the low trees where a group of elderly ladies were performing a fan dance. Nearby several men, all in their later years, had congregated with bird cages – some had two or three in their hands. Most were concealed by dark cloth.

But on this occasion there would be no transactions 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