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

He speaks in less than a whisper as the team seeks a spot to hide in the fields. In the distance, the huge urban center of Beijing has yet to wake. As we wait, the only sound is the quiet of the morning.

Suddenly, as the sky starts to lighten before dawn, we hear footsteps. The hunters have arrived.

Trapped

Overhead, countless migratory birds, some tiny enough that they can fit in the cup of a hand, are traveling to the south for winter.

They have benefited from the warmer months in northern regions, eating insects and fruit. As the year comes to a close and icy winds bring the early cold of winter, they head to warmer places to nest and feed.

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

The area of meadow in question, on the edges of the Chinese capital, is an refuge 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 thin you can barely see them.

A net we almost encountered was extending over half the length of the field and supported with wooden sticks. In the middle, a small finch was struggling frantically to free his legs, but the more it struggled, the more its claws became tangled.

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

Pursuing the Poachers

Silva, who is in his 30s, performs this duty for free using his personal funds. He has given up on many nights of sleep to set songbirds free, and he has spent the last 10 years persuading the police in Beijing to take this crime seriously.

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

So he gathered a team who were concerned and formed a group known as the Bird Protection Unit. He organized public meetings and invited the leaders of the local police and forestry bureau. These small and persistent acts of advocacy appear to have worked. The police found that apprehending illegal hunters also led to uncovering other kinds of criminal activity.

"We found our goals were partially aligned," Silva says, adding the caveat that the response is not uniform.

Silva's love of birds began during childhood. He was raised in the 1990s in a distinct era for the city.

He remembers wandering in the fields on the city's edges where he discovered 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 fast-paced development meant grasslands were seen as areas for development, not sanctuaries to conserve.

The change stunned Silva. The grasslands started disappearing, as did the ecosystems they sustained.

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

It has not been an easy life. One of Beijing's biggest bird dealers found out he was under scrutiny by Silva and retaliated.

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

He has also lost his army of volunteers over the years. This work requires stealth and sleepless nights. Silva says few people are willing to take on the difficult – and sometimes dangerous job.

"My life is devoted to this," he says. "I treat it as a mission because if you want to tackle this challenge, you must give it your all. You can't do it part-time."

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

So he has adopted new ways to hunt the hunters.

He analyzes aerial photos to find the trails worn away by the poachers. He charts these 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 catch hundreds of small birds at night.

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

Although there are environmental regulations in place, Silva believes the fines to deter the activity do not exceed the financial benefits of catching and selling songbirds.

Keeping a caged bird was – and for some people in China, still is – a status symbol. This dates back to the Qing dynasty. Nobles and elites would build ornate bamboo cages for their birds.

This custom that continues mainly among retired men in their 60s or 70s. Silva says older Chinese people may not understand they are committing a wildlife crime, or grasp that numerous birds had to die in a trap so they could buy a caged bird.

"These individuals often lacked enough to eat growing up. Now with a little money, they have inherited the habit and custom of caging birds," he says. "China developed so fast, there was little opportunity to educate people about ecology. Once adults' values are set, they're really hard to change."

Busted

Along a riverside path in Beijing, a trader has several small cages with tiny twittering birds.

Another man stands outside a local market holding a bird cage covered by a dark cloth. He informs passers-by quietly that his songbird is valuable, worth nearly 1900 yuan.

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

The area alongside the water stretches for several miles and on a sunny weekday morning, there were shoppers browsing everything from old trinkets to dentures.

We were told that protected birds could be bought in a nearby green space. It was easy to find.

Music was blasting from a speaker under the low trees where a group of elderly ladies were choreographing a traditional dance. Nearby several men, all over 50, had gathered with bird cages – some had multiple in their hands. Most were covered in dark cloth.

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